


Paranoia

by wily_one24



Category: Veronica Mars - Fandom
Genre: F/M, Suspense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-08-07
Updated: 2007-02-14
Packaged: 2017-11-05 19:24:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 48,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/410136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wily_one24/pseuds/wily_one24
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Somebody’s playing with Veronica’s head.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **Rating:** PG-13.  
>  **Summary:** Somebody’s playing with Veronica’s head.  
>  **Spoilers:** Post 2.22, so pretty much everything.

*~*~*~*

Her feet ached and her eyelids felt stuck together, the swollen skin of her ankles itched under her stockings. There was a heavy feeling of nausea in her stomach that grew from too much coffee and not enough food. She’d been on her feet for twelve straight hours, pulling a double shift at the Hut after Terri had called in sick.

Maybe, Veronica thought, she should start listening to Logan when he kept telling her not to work so hard, to take a well-earned break and have some fun during the last few days of summer. Sometimes she was almost tempted to quit, but then she’d remember the long book list that Hearst had sent her, the tuition fees, and her amazing shrinking bank balance. School fees, part time jobs, blisters on the balls of her feet and not enough time to see her boyfriend; that was the magic of Normal.

Veronica was a hairs breadth from giving up on the ideal altogether and becoming a kept woman. Logan would be delighted.

She kept her head down as she walked across the car park to the LeBaron, the shape of it familiar and comforting, promising a quick drive home and the bliss of her bed. Sometimes, on the odd occasion that she had cancelled plans with Logan to work, she’d come back to her car to find a surprise on the front seat.

A bunch of flowers, a teddy bear with a sickly sweet message on its belly, or a bag of cheeseburgers still warm. She wasn’t really picky. The burgers were long gone, the flowers were hanging upside down in front of her bedroom window; happily being dried and the teddy took pride of place on her pillow. It was perfect for snuggling under the covers, but she wouldn’t tell Logan that. His ego was big enough already.

All she wanted was to get home and take her shoes off, maybe even have a hot shower before the water turned cold. She could barely repress the moan of pleasure when she sat down, quickly slipping her sensible almost flat-soled shoes off and wiggling her toes at the pedals.

Her phone slid out of her bag easily as she dialed with one hand, slipped the key into the ignition with the other, and eased her protesting toes back into the prison of her shoes. The tone in her ear signaled her to leave a message.

“Dad, it’s me.” The engine roared to life. “We just closed up now. I’ll be home in ten.”

Somewhere along the way, she was sure, she was supposed to resent the constant badgering and near smothering eyes that watched her from all sides, but Veronica didn’t mind it. Well, she didn’t mind it too much.

After losing him once, it was still kinda nice to have her dad being overprotective, even though she was prepared for it to get old eventually, any day now.

The next number she called rang only three times before being picked up.

“Hey.” Her throat closed a little, thickening with warmth as she spoke. “What? No presents today? How’s a girl going to know she’s loved?”

The answer that was whispered into her ear made her both tingle and blush as she chuckled.

“You wish, Logan.” A pause and then she sighed. “No, I don’t… I’m just tired. I’m gonna go home and sleep. We’re still on for tomorrow, right?”

She closed her eyes, letting her free hand slide over the top of the wheel as she revved the engine. Logan’s voice sounded good, even if she knew his words were aimed to tease, to get a reaction out of her. This was normal, this easy banter between them.

“Tomorrow.” Her answer was pointed, but completely useless. He remembered and he knew and it would be Logan that was upset if she’d forgotten, not the other way around. “I have a day off and you’re teaching me to surf. Remember?”

Veronica chuckled low as she opened her eyes again and finally clicked her seat belt into place.

“That’s about the only way you’re gonna make me wet, you keep this up.”

His voice stretched out of the phone and through her mind.

“Yeah, me too.”

If only she could lie back and just sleep in the car right then. A ten-minute drive was too long and she was too tired to make it. She gave a yawn and clicked her phone off, tossing it back into her bag and focusing on easing her car onto the road.

If she hurried, she could probably cadge some form of cooking from her dad, that guilt card was lying there just waiting to be used; otherwise she’d be stuck with stale crackers. It was when she was seriously trying to weight the pros and cons of reheating the leftover Chinese in the fridge which might have been okay the day before, but should be well on the way to suspicious by the time she got home, that she heard the voice.

“Oh, Veronica, dear?”

She nearly screamed out loud as her foot slammed on the brakes.

Fourteen months.

Her heart thudded inside her chest, stark and violent against her ribs as her throat closed up so that the only sound she could hear was the squeak of her own breath coming in pants. She looked down at her hands, fingers clenched so tightly around the wheel that her knuckles were white and she felt as if the skin would crack over them.

It had been fourteen months or, more precisely, thirteen months, three weeks and two days, but she wasn’t going to be picky.

Veronica shook her head clear; forcing herself awake as she took deep breaths, slowly eased her foot off the brake and felt the car lurch forward again. Luckily, it was after dark and the streets weren’t crowded. There was nobody behind her to complain about her sudden lack of all mental capacity.

And, really, that was the only way to describe it. The day had taken more out of her than she thought, added to the unbearable feeling of having to walk the high wire of waiting for the next big mystery or tragedy to strike, and the late nights of not being able to sleep due to the nightmares, everything had all added up.

Boiled down? She’d gone nuts, temporarily of course. Temporary insanity, it was the only sane explanation.

She really needed to get a good night’s sleep.

The second she started the car moving again, an arm came down around her throat.

“I know you don’t like me, Veronica.” The voice growled into her ear. “But ignoring me is just plain rude.”

Great, her auditory hallucinations were manifesting physically.

Her fingers clawed at the wrist that blocked her windpipe, nails digging into his flesh, even as her brain told her that it wasn’t happening, couldn’t be happening. There was no possible way he was there, sitting behind her, anchoring her to the driver’s seat.

“Pull over.”

She couldn’t stop her eyes scanning the road ahead, the darkened, empty road. If he was real and she stopped the car, then she was history. If she didn’t stop the car, given the fact she was about to pass out due to her lungs bursting open right inside her chest, then she’d be history whether he was real or not.

Her foot slowly eased off the accelerator and he reached forward to put the gear in park.

“That’s better.” Even as she tried to tell herself it wasn’t real, Veronica could already taste the fire and ashes that came with hearing his voice. “You and I need to have a talk.”

She shook her head, trying to get some breathing space for her larynx.

“Do you know how long it’s been, Ve-ron-ica?” The numbers rang through her head again, even as her back bowed, thrusting her chest up and out, thirteen months, three weeks and two... “Fourteen months.”

Looked like neither of them were going to be picky about the details.

“No.” She managed to gasp out as she threw her hand to the side, reaching for her bag. “Please…”

His free hand shot out and grabbed her wrist, wrapping his fingers around it painfully.

“Ah ah, now. That’s not nice.”

Her feet scrambled against the floor, trying to push the pedals into achieving something, anything other than over revving the engine in park. Veronica felt her throat tighten even further, it made her lungs burn and she wondered if that was sense memory or just the current demand for oxygen.

She closed her eyes and tried not to remember the panic.

“What do you have in here, hm?” His left arm stayed wrapped around her, fingers closing around her throat and keeping her still as his right hand frisked the empty seat for her bag. “I know you’re not reaching for your make up, so what’s in here?”

A bright hiss sounded and she felt her whole body tense. The spark of blue bit into the corner of her eyes as he charged the taser a few times experimentally. It had only been two months since the rooftop, certainly not long enough to forget the feel of those volts shooting through her veins.

It made her whimper and him laugh.

“Relax, Veronica.” He chuckled into her ear and she wanted to wash it, scrub the feel of his breath away. “That’s a little arch, even for me.”

There was a soft scratching under her chin and she realized with a jolt that one of his fingers was caressing her. The charger dropped to the floor and she concentrated on trying to breathe as he continued to dig through her belongings.

“Or could it be your phone?” She could hear the sudden change in his voice, the casual interest that masked grim purpose. “Who were you going to call? Your dad again? Think he’d come save you from the big bad wolf, Veronica? Think he’d get here in time?”

He was behind her, she could feel it, and the only thing separating them was a foot of foam and steel and cloth. She could feel the heat of him pressing into her back, each breath that rasped through his lips. It was intimate in a way that made her empty stomach grind in against itself.

“Or possibly?” She jerked again when the small square of her phone bounced along the passenger side floor. “Were you going to call my son? I have to admit; he does have this whole knight in shining armor thing going, doesn’t he? Out to save all the damsels.”

The hand at her throat clenched and she bit her tongue.

“It’d make a father proud if it wasn’t, you know, for the fact that he keeps interrupting my plans!”

Suddenly she couldn’t tell if she was driving home from a long shift at the Hut, or she was back in that fridge, feeling the air sucked of all moisture, so dry that it crackled in the heat, the smell of gasoline stinging the edges of her mouth and nostrils and eyes.

“Please, let me go.” She couldn’t help the whimper as her lips stretched out and her tongue pushed against the pressure constricting her chin and throat, trying to form the proper shape of the words. “Please.”

A dark splotch appeared in front of her face and she blinked at it.

“Ah, now, see?” His voice turned soft and sleek, like treacle, poured thickly over her neck as his free hand came up to brush the edges of her face. “That’s what I’ve been missing. You crying, begging for your life.”

He chuckled again when she went limp in his hands.

“You know, I thought nothing would beat the memory of bashing that tramps head in.” It was like he was discussing the weather, the way he kept his voice casual. “But I was wrong. You want to know what was better? What kept me warm all those months in jail, Veronica?”

She tried to shake her head.

“It was you.” The fingers that weren’t wrapped around her throat were sliding softly over her face, even as she forced her eyes closed and tried not to feel it. “The rush of having someone actually beg for their life. Lilly? She was quick, it’s almost disappointing to think about now. All over too soon. If I could do it again, I’d make it last that much longer.”

Even behind her closed lids, Veronica was beginning to see spots.

“I’d want to listen to her crying. I’d want to feel the last ounces of her life struggling away as I held her down. I only got a taste of that with you.” His grip got tighter. “You, Veronica, you blue balled me in the worst way. And I plan on getting what’s mine.”

Everything went dark.

***

The sound of her cell ringing woke her.

Veronica sat up straight with a gasp, her hands clawing at her neck as she spun around. There was nobody there, nobody in the car with her. She spun around, looking left and right, back and forth. There was nothing but her car, parked in an odd angle to the side of the road, the lights flooding out weakly in front.

She lunged for the phone on the floor, checking the ID.

“Dad!” Her voice sounded jagged and scratched. “Dad, he was here!”

“Veronica?” She could hear the panic and fear in his voice, knew it was because of her. “Are you okay? Where are you? You should have been home an hour ago. Who? Who was there?”

Her fingers shook as she held the phone to her ear with one hand and started the car with the other.

“Just…” She took in a shuddering breath. “Just meet me at the police station.”

***

It was a short drive, but it took longer than it should have due to the fact she had to pull over three times. Once to throw up, the rest to check the car over, inside out, taser clutched firmly in her hand. It had taken her a long time to stop checking the rear view mirror compulsively the last time.

Keith had gotten there before her, she saw him as she drove up, standing in front of the station and looking scared. He was with one of the night shift deputies she didn’t recognize. She didn’t bother to park the car properly, just eased the engine off and sprinted towards him.

“Dad!” Her arms went around his neck and she felt his hands around the back of her waist. “Dad, oh my god, he was there, in my backseat. And he had me by the throat!”

She felt the tears coming, a great wave of them.

“Who, honey?” The movement of his chin over the top of her head was familiar and she knew he was gesturing towards the deputy. “Who was there?”

“Aaron.” Even as the name left her mouth, she knew. She knew what his reaction would be and some of the edge left her as she deflated. “It was Aaron Echolls.”

The panic bled out of his eyes, leaving nothing but worry and weary resignation as his hands came up to cradle her head. He leaned forward to kiss her brow.

“Aaron Echolls wasn’t in your car.”

“No!” She insisted. “He was, it was him. I felt him, I heard him.”

“Car’s empty.” The deputy announced and Veronica spun to look at him, standing next to the open door of her LeBaron with a puzzled expression. “There’s no sign of anyone other than the driver.”

“Dad, listen to me.” She was reduced to begging and she didn’t care. “It was him; I know it. He had me by the neck, look!”

Veronica thrust her head back and up, baring her throat to him.

“There has to be bruises, right? He was choking me!”

“Veronica.” Her father’s voice was soft and gentle, as if she was six and he was trying to quieten one of her nightmares. She felt his fingers brush over the skin at her neck, checking. “If anyone was there, it wasn’t Aaron. You know that. Did you actually see him?”

Her shoulders dropped.

“He was behind me.” Her voice was flat and getting flatter with each word. She knew he didn’t believe her. “I couldn’t turn around and then he was gone when I…”

He didn’t smile, there wasn’t even the familiar flash of amusement in his eyes, but she could feel it anyway.

“What, Veronica? When you woke up?” He pulled her in for a hug. “I think you’re working too hard. I think the stress of everything is finally getting to you. Come on, I’ll drive you home and we can pick your car up in the morning.”

“But Dad…”

“And we’ll talk about this tomorrow, when you’ve had a decent sleep.”

She pulled out of his grasp.

“I didn’t fall asleep at the wheel! I know what I’m saying and I know it was him.” But she was fighting a losing battle and they both knew it. “You have to believe me, Dad, it was Aaron.”

“Veronica.” He placed his hands on her shoulders and looked her straight in the eye. “You and I both know Aaron Echolls is dead. He was shot in his hotel room at the Neptune Grand, the same night Cassidy Casablancas jumped. He was buried two months ago.”

***  



	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's good to know where you stand on the 'Is Veronica crazy as a loon?' debate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Rating:** PG-13. (Just letting you know: the rating is low, but the matter might be disturbing to some).  
>  **Summary:** Somebody’s playing with Veronica’s head.   
> **Spoilers:** Post 2.22, so pretty much everything.

***  
Veronica felt her body rise and fall, soothed by the repetitive motions. The morning sun on her back was warm, not quite blisteringly hot, but getting there. She felt her limbs heavy and limp as she lay there on her stomach. The ripples of water underneath the board echoed in her ear. In the distance, she heard the soft sound of people on the beach, far away from her, a gull overhead, and the ever-present breaking of waves on the sand. 

She felt him before she heard him. 

The rise of the board pushing her up, the swell of the water lapping at her skin, the sound of his hand coming up and the feel of cold water trickling over her back before he touched her. She smiled as his fingers tapped a pattern on the small of her back. 

“You know, you actually have to stand up sooner or later.” Logan’s voice was more amused than anything. “Otherwise you can’t call it surfing.”

“I’m thinking about it.” He was almost smiling at her when she opened her eyes, sitting upright on his board with his legs hanging over the side, feet idly paddling in the depths below. “You know, I think I like this surfing thing.”

He frowned. 

“You’re not surfing. You’re bobbing. Like a cork.”

“It’s peaceful.” She yawned, stretching out like a cat. “And relaxing.”

“It’s not meant to be peaceful.” He sounded honestly offended. “It’s meant to be exhilarating. A rush! Come on, there’s a few good swells left. We can still catch them if you get off your ass.”

She had to smile at him, sitting there almost bouncing up and down on his board like a little kid before Christmas, even when she knew he was putting it on, that he was watching her with a keen eye. 

“No, I’m good.” Her head fell back to her hands, folded underneath her chin. “I think I’ll bob the next few out. You go, though.”

They both paused and she could feel it stretching out between them. She tensed when his hand came back, running down the length of her spine. 

“Veronica, are you sure you’re okay?”

“Don’t.” All the warmth had drained away and she didn’t look at his face so she wouldn’t have to see it close up. “Just don’t, Logan.”

“But…”

She was tired. She hadn’t gotten any sleep the night before, tossing and turning, hearing that voice in her ear and feeling the hands around her throat. Her whole body was heavy with exhaustion and the only time she’d felt remotely comfortable was when she and Logan had paddled out and she could see the expanse of ocean separating her from anyone and everything else. 

She was too tired to do this anymore. 

“It was him, okay?” Her jaw clenched around her words. “I know you don’t believe me, nobody believes me, but it was him. Your father isn’t dead.”

Her board rose and fell with the surge of him lowering himself down to lie flat on his own board. He reached out and took hold of the edge of hers, bringing her in close until they were face to face, eye to eye. 

“I believe you believe it, Veronica.” His hands found hers, wet fingers tracing patterns on her sun warmed skin. “That’s what scares me.”

She didn’t answer him, just rose and fell with the ripples. 

“He’s dead.” Logan sighed eventually. “And not even a little bit dead, he’s a whole lot of dead. I know this, because I identified the body, remember?”

Her hand reached out and traced the line of his hair above his forehead. His hair was wet and slick, flattened to his scalp. She kept her mouth closed. 

“And that’s not some quaint little phrase either.” His words were patient, but pointed. “I actually saw his body lying on some metal table. They took the sheet off his face and I nodded and said ‘yep, that’s him’. Is any of this ringing any bells with you? Aaron Echolls is dead, Veronica.”

She sighed and rolled sideways off the board, losing herself in the roll of the current, her body turned over and over as the sun sparkled into a thousand different patterns above her. 

***

They ate lunch in silence. 

Sandwiches made side-by-side at her kitchen bench, barefoot in the kitchen with sand and salt still clinging to their ankles. Backup begged half-heartedly and she relented by giving him a doggie treat as Logan took their plates outside so they could eat by the pool.

Her fingers picked nervously at the fraying edges of her shorts. 

“Maybe your dad’s right.” Logan suggested, watching her out of the corner of his eye. “Maybe you should take some time off work.”

“It’s not work.”

It wasn’t an answer, but she didn’t really care. She already knew her dad was talking to her manager at the Hut and arguing with either him or Logan was pointless. Whether she liked it or not, she was going to have an enforced holiday. 

“And maybe…” She closed her eyes as Logan continued; she already knew what was coming. “Maybe you should see someone.”

“You? Logan Echolls? You’re suggesting I see a therapist?” The chuckle came out sounding slightly bitterer than she’d planned. “That’s rich.”

His plate clattered on the patio table as he pushed it aside to face her. 

“There was nobody in that car, Veronica, your dad had the police look it over.”

She stood up and grabbed his abandoned plate. 

“No.” Her voice shook and she hated it. “There were no signs of anyone else in the car. That’s doesn’t mean nobody was there. You and I both know that.”

She left him sitting there as she walked back into the apartment. It wasn’t a surprise that he came after her, just that he waited until she was already inside. 

“Look.” He grabbed her wrist, taking the plates from her hand and putting them on the bench before turning her to face him. “You’ve been through so much, Veronica, nobody would think any less of you if you admitted it was finally taking it’s toll.”

She rolled her eyes up to the ceiling. 

“Well.” She chuckled to hide the shake in her voice. “It’s good to know where you stand on the ‘Is Veronica crazy as a loon?’ debate.”

His eyes darkened as he watched her, spreading out into pools of concern. She wanted to give into him, to let him have his way and just blindly go ahead with all their suggestions, but she knew what had happened and she knew she wasn’t losing her mind. 

“You’re not crazy.” He sighed. “You’re just…”

When he struggled to find the right word, Veronica kindly helped him. 

“Seeing dead people?”

“Yes!” His hands jerked once in agreement. “Doesn’t that tell you something?”

Veronica gently took her wrists out of his reach. 

“It tells me that no one believes me and I’m all alone. It tells me that the Neptune Sheriff’s Department is a lot more incompetent than even I gave them credit for, and that’s really saying something. It tells me that unless I figure out what’s happening, I’m in a lot of trouble.”

He just stared at her. 

“Veronica.”

She held up her hand to ward him off. 

“I’m tired, due to my overwhelming exhaustion and complete inability to distinguish fact from fantasy.” The barb in her words couldn’t be missed. “I’m going to go lie down.”

When she turned to the hallway, Veronica’s chest tightened and she hated that she had to turn back, had to look at him with her eyes close to watering. 

“Logan?” Her chin wobbled. “Please don’t leave. Even if you’re angry, please don’t leave me alone.”

All the fight drained out of him, she could see it practically spreading out into a puddle on the floor at his feet, leaving nothing but worry in his face. By the couch, Backup lifted his head wearily to give a small whine of comfort, but he didn’t get up. 

“I’m not going anywhere.” He gestured to the television casually. “There are probably a thousand soaps I have to catch up on.”

Relief flooded her muscles and she smiled at him, soft and small. All the memories hit her then, of last summer, when she didn’t want to be alone and he’d stayed with her when her dad was still in the hospital and his was in jail. He’d joked at the time that Passions’ audience had doubled when he and Backup watched. 

“Thank you.”

He nodded back at her and she sighed as she walked to her room. 

***

She only meant to close her eyes for a minute. 

That’s what she told herself when she first fell onto the mattress. She was too stressed and too worried, too keyed up to really relax enough to get any rest, especially when her father and Logan kept looking at her as if she was set to explode any second. 

Her head was too heavy and her eyes closed and then she couldn’t remember anything after that. 

But she felt the footstep next to her bed. 

“Logan?” She rolled onto her back, opening her eyes slowly. “What time is…?”

A hand came down over her mouth hard. 

“No, not Logan.”

Her eyes widened as he easily caught her hands in his free hand and held them above her head. She jerked her knees up, trying to thrash at him, make contact, get him to let her go. He brought his knee up and pressed down firmly on her stomach with it. 

It made her heave, but it also made it impossible to fight. 

“I don’t think you understand what’s happening, Veronica.” This time she could see his face and she really wished she couldn’t. “These little meetings we have? You’re not supposed to tattle on me.”

His eyes glittered meanly, his right hand pressed her lips down over her teeth, his left hand held her wrists above her head, his right knee pressed deep in her belly stealing her breath and his body was leaning in over hers. She wanted to scream as he smiled widely. 

“Go ahead.” He challenged. “Make a sound, I dare you. Kick the wall; bring Logan in here. As much as I want this to last, Veronica, I have no problem snapping your neck and ending it in a second. You’ll be dead and I might spend decades rotting in prison for it, but I’ll still go to sleep with that memory bringing a smile to my face every night.”

He let his foot drop onto her thigh and she stiffened with the implication. 

“Yeah, I thought so.”

Aaron Echolls was dead. She knew that to be a fact. She remembered going with Logan and waiting outside the mortuary as he identified the body, she remembered rubbing circles into his back all that night when he threw up because of it. They’d gone to the funeral and watched from a distance, avoiding the cameras that had inevitably shown up. 

She’d worn bright colors and a very big smile. 

There was no question about it; Aaron Echolls was dead. Except for the fact that he had her pinned to the bed and was hovering over her with his eyes narrowed down to spiteful little darts. 

Veronica had the distinct impression that maybe Logan and her father were right and she should seek therapy. 

“Now, there’s a shirt above your head, Veronica, to the left a little. I’m going to let one of your hands go and you’re going to reach for it. You try anything stupid…” His hands tightened against her cheek and her wrists. “Well, let’s not find out, shall we?”

Her options were limited and she nodded. 

Strange, that her first instinct was to scratch out at him. She knew the warnings; she’d heard all the advice and stranger danger messages. They’d been ground into her from the moment she was born. The first and only rule, she knew, was to stay alive. To that end, when somebody had you at a disadvantage like this, you did whatever he said and you prayed they let you go in one piece. 

It took a few seconds of fumbling blindly before her fingers found the cloth. 

When she brought it back down, a flash of green caught her eye and she recognized it as one of her favorites. She’d worn it only two days before when she and Logan had watched movies on the couch and she’d been wearing it to bed every night since. She wished she’d stayed out there and suffered through the pitying looks. 

“See?” Aaron’s eyes smiled. “It’s almost as if you can follow an instruction. Imagine that. Now let’s see about this one: don’t scream.”

Before she knew what had happened, he’d let go of her mouth, grabbed the shirt and then began forcing it through her lips and teeth, stuffing it solidly into her jaw. She gagged around it, her eyes watering, and he continued to smile. 

“Now that’s better isn’t it?” He obviously wanted an answer, but she wouldn’t give it to him as he grabbed her free hand and brought it back to capture it with the other. He shrugged. “You want to know what makes you special, Veronica?”

She hated Aaron Echolls, real or imagined, physically present or hallucinated, she hated him and he scared her beyond all reason. 

“You fight back.” The way he announced the words, it was obvious they held special meaning to him, as if he was announcing an accolade. “Nobody fights me anymore. Not even Logan fights me. He hates me, sure, he plays these stupid games of chicken to egg me on, sure, but he doesn’t fight it. He just takes it.”

Her eyes shut tightly; she didn’t want to hear it, any of it. 

“He broke when he was still very little.” She felt him lean down closer, felt his breath on her cheek. “It makes me want to see how far I have to push you until you break. Until you just take it.”

She began to struggle in earnest, bucking under him and trying to scream against the gag in her mouth. He tightened his hold on her wrists and grabbed her chin with his free hand, shoving it up and back. Her neck stretched out before him and she had to stop thrashing to concentrate on breathing. 

“I warned you, Veronica, don’t push me. Are you going to be good?”

Her answer was a sob into the shirt, garbled and broken and terrified. 

“But you?” His voice continued, as if there hadn’t been any interruption. “You put me in jail. I waited all those months, even to the very last minute of that trial, up on the stand, I waited for Logan’s testimony and it never came. Funny, isn’t it? That he let you be crucified so easily and he wouldn’t bring up the most damning evidence of all?”

One of his thumbs began to stroke her wrist, down the side of it, and she looked at it with horror. She could see her hands dwarfed in his, stretched out above her, she could see the wall behind her head and the shelves above it, the tables to the side, but she couldn’t see him anymore and that was almost a blessing. 

“You gave me so many things to think about, all alone in my cell. You know that?” His free hand came to rest on her cheek, near her eye. “The prosecution, they were so helpful, they sent all those photos to my lawyers and me, all the police evidence.”

She realized with a start that his hand blanketed the area that had been covered by bruises. 

His bruises. 

“I know exactly how much damage I got in.” Her heart froze when he kept stroking her wrist. “I have to tell you; it kept me up at night. I had your photo up in my cell. It kept a lot of my fellow inmates up at night, too.”

A whimper broke around the gag when he began shifting their hands to the right. Her fingers closed into a fist, making itself as small as possible. She could see the candle sitting by the bed, the flame already high. 

“Let me ask, do you ever imagine what might have happened if your dad hadn’t interrupted us so early?”

She shook her head. 

“No? Because I do.” His grip became harder the more she resisted it. “I do all the time.”

The first lick of flame felt like a tickle. 

“That’s it.” He rode out her struggles with ease, pressing his knee further into the soft flesh of her belly. “That’s it, Veronica. Just like that.”

She wasn’t sure what made her scream harder, the pain shooting down her arm or the pleasure in his voice. 

“Veronica?” Logan’s voice sounded from the door. “Are you okay?”

She doubled her efforts, trying to make the sounds in her throat carry past the gag, finally getting the courage to kick out at the wall and make noise. Aaron growled down at her then brought his face in close. 

“Just remember, I can get to you. It doesn’t matter if you have Logan, or your dad, or even your dog. I’ll be back.”

He knocked the lit candle onto the bed and the pillowcase lit up. She felt the heat of it on her face as he let her go. Her lungs screamed and she nearly jackknifed off the bed as soon as she felt Aaron go. Her hand pulled the shirt out of her mouth and she began thrashing the burning cloth with it.

“Veronica!”

“Logan!” Her voice came out shaky and she coughed. “Logan, in here!”

A loud thump sounded and Backup gave a small whine. 

“Veronica, open the door! It’s locked.”

Aaron was gone and she saw her window was open. Her fingers shook badly when she slipped the lock off and Logan pushed into the room. His eyes scanned the bed, the charred pillowcase and the tipped candle on top of it. He turned back to grab her shoulders. 

“God, I thought something was happening.”

She gaped at him, unable to speak as he wrapped her in his arms. 

“Don’t scare me like that, Veronica, geez.”

“But.” She pulled back and gestured to the bed. “But something did happen, it was…”

Her words trailed off. 

“Veronica?” His eyes widened when he looked at her. “Jesus, Veronica, your wrist.”

She let him take hold of her arms and lead her to the bathroom. Let him turn the cold taps on and thrust her wrists underneath it. She could see the blisters forming through the stream as it flowed down and around her pain. 

Her voice was soft and quiet. 

“It was Aaron.”

Logan stiffened next to her. 

***

She lay on her side on the couch with a pillow under her head, a second pillow clutched tightly to her chest and a pit bull resting his chin in front of her face, his eyes staring into hers, large and dark and watery. In the distance, she vaguely heard two voices whispering to each other in the kitchen. 

__

-There was nobody there; I looked.   
-Could there have been?  
-I don’t know, her window was open, but there was nobody around. She made me search the entire property: nada.   
-What do you think it was?  
-Honestly? It looked like she had a nightmare and knocked the candle over.   
-I’m worried about her, Logan.   
-And you think I’m not? She’s seeing my dead father!

When he’d gotten home Keith had taken her to the late night doctor on Melrose to examine and bandage her wrist. She’d tearfully and nearly hysterically made the doctor check her stomach for any damage and there hadn’t even been a bruise, he’d prescribed her a strong sedative after that and Veronica was surprised when Keith had been definite in encouraging her to take it. He never approved of drugs. 

__

-I thought, after the episode with Cassidy, I thought she was fine. I should have known…  
-She fooled everyone, Mr. Mars. I mean, to be fair, it’s not like Veronica to completely lose it like this.   
-Is it possible?  
-Do I think she’s seeing dead men? No. Do I think there might be someone out there trying to make her believe she is? Maybe. But unlikely. Backup didn’t even growl, he would have if someone were there. Don’t you think?   
-I don’t know what to do. I really don’t. 

Veronica sighed as she looked at Backup’s eyes. She didn’t know why he hadn’t gone on alert the second Aaron had even come close to the apartment. She didn’t even know anymore if Aaron had been there. The more she thought about it, the more her father and Logan made sense. 

She forced her legs off the couch and lurched herself upright. The sedative had made her slow and fuzzy, her socked feet slid clumsily on the floor as she shuffled to the cupboard in the hall. Her hand batted ineffectually at the shelves twice before her fingers closed on the garish green bag. 

If she let herself drift off on the couch, she knew her dad or Logan would pick her up effortlessly and lie her flat on her bed then leave her there. Even if they had the presence of mind to leave the door open, she’d be alone. 

“Dad?” She mumbled thickly and held up the bag. “Can I sleep in your room? I have my turtles.”

Keith looked at her, concern creasing his brow.

“Sure, sweetie, whatever you want.”

Never drive again? Check.   
Never be alone? Check. 

She could learn to live like that. 

Somehow. 

***


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You think I’m making it up, too? You think I’m imagining this big bad wolf to continue some self-hating, sadomasochistic need to punish myself even more?

*~*~*~*

“Why are you here, Veronica?”

She leaned her head back against the chair and looked up to the ceiling. It was sectioned into square panels, each three feet across and down of plain gray stucco. If she had some leverage, it would be fairly simple to push one up into the roof and climb into the inevitable air vent or crawl space.

Escape.

It was tempting.

“Because they think I’m crazy.”

“They?”

She briefly considered giving a sarcastic answer, describing ‘they’ as the fourteen voices in her head. Seven men, six women and a hippopotamus named Mike. Instead, she carefully examined the skin at the edges of her thumbnail.

“My dad, Logan, Wallace, everyone.”

Evading the truth wasn’t going to help her and she wasn’t entirely sure that they were wrong.

“What about you? Do you think that, and I stress that I’m using your terminology not mine, you’re crazy?”

“I… uh.” The question stunned her for a second. She wasn’t sure what the right answer was and she couldn’t remember if anyone had asked her. The fingernails of her right hand picked at the scab forming on her left wrist. “No. No, I don’t.”

She brought her face down again and looked over the desk to meet calm blue eyes, almost challenging them to disagree with her.

“Well, then.” Dr. Frey just crossed her hands together on top of the desk. “I ask you again, why are you here?”

***

_“Veronica?” Her dad blinked as he stumbled out of his room, drawing a robe over his track pants. “What are you doing up so early?”_

_“It was in the dishes, Dad! Don’t you see? It had to be.”_

_She couldn’t see anything past the steam rising above her hands, plunged deep into the sink and scrubbing furiously at the silver bowl. At her ankle, Backup sat looking up at her with a resigned expression. He’d long ago given up hope of her moving from that spot._

_“What are you talking about, honey?”_

_Veronica looked up._

_“He drugged Backup. It’s the only way.” The crinkling of his face screamed disbelief, so she looked back down to the sink. “Backup was acting weird all day yesterday. He didn’t even want to go for a walk and when doesn’t he want to go for a walk? Never, that’s when. You know…”_

_“Veronica?” He sounded tired, weary and tired and almost angry. “Nobody drugged Backup. Look at yourself, look what you’re doing to your burns. Stop it.”_

_“But…” Frustration bubbled inside her shoulders. “You didn’t see his eyes, last night when I was on the couch, Backup’s eyes were all big and unfocused and…”_

_She felt him walk up behind her._

_“Last night? After you’d been doped up? Are you sure it wasn’t your eyes that were unfocused?”_

_His hands came around her to turn off the tap in the sink and she felt him like a wall, strong and solid and just there. She could have cried._

_“It’s not my imagination.” The words caught like hooks in her mouth and they brought tears to her eyes. “It’s not.”_

_“I know you believe that, Veronica.” He turned her around, pulling her arms out of the sink and away from the bowls. “But are you listening to yourself? Dead men coming back to life to drug the dog?”_

_Her shoulders and elbows locked and she kept her arms straight, even as he ran his hands down the side of her face and pulled her into his chest. She wanted to give in, she did, but she couldn’t. It was becoming a sticking point and she was going to prove them all wrong if it killed her._

_And it really might this time._

_“I’m going to talk to some friends of mine.” When he spoke again, she could tell he was being careful. “To see if I can get you an appointment to see someone. Will you go?”_

_“Do I have a choice?”_

_“Veronica.” His voice trapped her, the same voice that always had her confessing the most trivial things, down to being the one who finished the milk. “I think it might be good for you, to be able to talk to someone who has a little distance from everything that’s happened lately.”_

_She nodded into his chest and he cupped the back of her head._

_“I’m worried about you, kiddo. I know you don’t like the idea of counseling, but I don’t know what else to do.” She didn’t bother telling him he could believe her, she already knew what the answer to that would be. “You can’t keep going on like this.”_

_“I know.”_

_That seemed to calm him and he relaxed his arms from around her shoulders. They both ignored the fact that she hadn’t relaxed at all. Her hands hung limply, the skin on them a bright angry red from the scalding water._

_“So, what do you think?” His voice turned bright and helpful. “After you made poor Backup here watch you scrub the silver off his dishes for who knows how long, don’t you think you should at least feed him?”_

_Veronica shrugged and didn’t meet his eyes._

_“I can’t.”_

_“Why?” Suspicion edged into his voice._

_“Because.” She shrugged again and made herself busy grabbing a cloth to dry the dishes. “I threw out all of his food.”_

_Keith frowned._

_“There was at least a week’s worth there.”_

_She sighed and braced herself for the recriminations._

_“It was all here when Aaron was, we can’t be sure it wasn’t exposed to contamination.”_

***

Dr. Frey scribbled some notes onto the pad on her desk. She had glasses with simple frames and freckles that weren’t hidden behind layers of foundation. Veronica didn’t want to admit it, but she might have liked her under different circumstances.

“How long has it been since you’ve seen Aaron?”

Veronica lifted her feet from the floor and tucked her knees underneath her chin.

“That depends on who you’re asking, doesn’t it?”

That earned her a raise of the eyebrow.

“What do you mean by that?”

She squirmed under the direct questioning, hugging her legs in close to her body.

“Do you always answer a question with a question?”

The doctor’s mouth pursed up into an amused expression.

“Do you? Veronica?”

“Ooh, touché.” She nodded her acquiescence and breathed in. “Okay, well, if you ask the general public, the last time I saw Aaron was two months ago, just before he was shot, killed and subsequently buried. And if you ask my dad and Logan, the last time I think I saw him was a week ago, when he was in my room with the candle.”

Her wrist itched when she thought about it.

“And?” The doctor urged. “What if I’m asking you?”

Veronica clenched her fingers and held her breath, before releasing it slowly.

“Two days ago.”

If she wasn’t looking for it, she would have missed the slight tic of the doctor’s eye, but she saw it, a small, almost imperceptible flicker that denoted surprise. She looked hard for the disbelief and found herself relieved that it wasn’t there. Not on the surface, at least.

“I mean.” She continued in a rush. “I don’t know if you can really say I saw him. It wasn’t like the other times. He wasn’t like there, there. He didn’t touch me, or anything, but I know it was him. I’m fairly sure it was. It had to be, right?”

“He didn’t threaten you again?” Veronica shook her head. “What did he do?”

She bit her bottom lip.

“He walked by the window across the street from our office.”

“I’m sorry?”

The raised eyebrows and sudden disbelief were something she’d expected, pretty much what she thought her father’s face might have looked like if she’d said anything at the time.

“I was at the office with dad and I looked out the window. He… uh… it was just a flash, a shadow in one of the windows across the street, but I know it was him. He’s been watching me.”

Somehow, Veronica had suspected that Keith wouldn’t exactly be eager to close off all exits and then search the building from top to bottom, based on a shadow passing by a window frame. She hadn’t said anything, just sat at her desk clenching and unclenching her fists until she could breathe calmly again.

“I see. So, you didn’t tell your father? Or Logan?” At the shake of Veronica’s head, the doctor continued. “Why not?”

“Because they don’t believe me.” She felt dizzy with all the circles they were talking in. “I told you, they already think I’m crazy.”

“You keep saying ‘they’.”

Veronica rolled her eyes.

“That’s because there’s more than one of them. It doesn’t mean anything. It’s the correct plural term, isn’t it?”

Dr. Frey gave her a pointed look.

“It’s also very exclusionary. The way you’ve been talking, it sounds as if you’ve pitted a battle with you on one side and your father, Logan and Wallace on the other.”

Her face fell forward into the cradle of her knees and she pushed her kneecaps into the sockets of her eyes until she saw neon patterns. The ache was comfortable and familiar.

“They’re just trying to help. I know that. I mean, if I wasn’t me; I’d think I was going ‘round the bend.”

***

_“You want choc fudge or mint chip?”_

_Veronica rolled her eyes._

_“Yeah, stupid question. Both, right?”_

_She pouted._

_“It’s like you don’t even know me.”_

_Wallace grinned as he produced a bottle of chocolate syrup from the bag on the bench. Veronica gasped as she held out her hands._

_“Gimme, gimme, gimme!”_

_When he’d finished dishing out the ice cream, Wallace slumped onto the couch next to her, easily handing Veronica her bowl. To his credit, he only grimaced once at the amount of syrup she began squeezing out over the top._

_“So?” She asked, happily digging a spoon into the confection. “What happened to the butter pecan I ordered?”_

_“I just figured there were enough nuts in here already.”_

_She coughed, before quickly recovering with a blank expression. Blank, that is, except for the small smile that edges the corners of her mouth and a slight flush on her cheeks. She wasn’t going to make a fuss and she knew she didn’t have to. That’s why she and Wallace were friends. He didn’t expect fusses._

_Maybe a little fuss, she amended._

_Veronica nudged her shoulder into his. He nudged back._

_God, she hated it when they got emotional like that._

_“This has really gotta suck for Logan, huh?”_

_“Huh?” She frowned at the spoon in front of her mouth. “What do you mean?”_

_“Well, just think about it.” His voice was already high with teasing and she loved it. “His father comes back from the dead and doesn’t even bother to say hi, just haunts your skinny white ass.”_

_The laughter was sudden and loud and so welcome she could have cried with it. She needed it, so desperately needed to take a step back and look at everything. It was times like this she knew why Wallace was her best friend._

_Even if she knew that when she settled back on the couch with his arm over her shoulders and faced the screen, his eyes would slide down and over to watch her with a worried frown. Even if she knew that he’d spent the morning talking to Logan and her dad, that when her dad got back from work they’d leave her on the couch and go talk in private. About her. Even if she knew he didn’t believe her._

_But right then, with her, Wallace wasn’t making her feel like a three year old checking for monsters under the bed._

***

“I know Aaron Echolls is dead.” Veronica kept picking at the scabs on her wrist. “I’m not delusional. I know Logan identified his body. I know he was buried and has a nice little tombstone. But that doesn’t change the fact that he was in my car and in my room last week. And I know how that sounds, don’t think I don’t, because I do.”

Dr. Frey tapped her fingers on the desk in an idle pattern.

“How can you be sure it was really him?”

Veronica tried not to roll her eyes.

“I know Aaron Echolls when I see and hear him.”

“Do you?” Long, slender fingers flicked idly through the file in front of her. “From my notes and from what you’ve told me, you hadn’t spent that much time with him before the night he attacked you, and only once or twice after that.”

“You don’t forget that.” She could feel the steel enter her voice. “You don’t forget something like that. He held me down, he…”

“Did he?”

Veronica’s breath caught in her throat.

“What? How can you ask me that?”

“I’m not doubting the severity of this situation, Veronica, but if you’re going to base the theory that the man you’ve been seeing lately is Aaron Echolls on the fact that he held you down in the same way he did before, then the assumption is that he must have done it before.”

“He did…” Her face screwed up in thought. “I mean… not…”

“According to your testimony, he knocked you out that night and you woke up already locked in the fridge.”

“Yes, I mean, no… I mean.” She slumped. “Yes. But his voice. His voice is the same. And you can’t fake that. Except, you know, if you had his voice from all his movies, but he keeps saying my name. And that’s exactly like it was that night.”

She hissed as the nails on her right hand finally cracked the shell of crusting around the burn on her left wrist. Clear, thin fluid leaked out and wet her fingertips. She spread it into the surrounding skin, hid the evidence quickly.

“You don’t forget something like that.”

“And your injuries?” Dr. Frey chose that moment to gesture to her wrists. “Why would he do that?”

“I had burns on my wrists that night. From the fridge and from saving my dad. Pretty much in the same place.”

The way the doctor kept looking at them made Veronica squirm as she buried her hands underneath her calves, clutching around her thighs.

“And the fact you keep picking at them, not letting them heal? Why do you think that is?”

“Aaron Echolls is dead.” Veronica insisted; her chin planted firmly on her knees. “He has to be.”

***

_She dialed the number quickly with fumbling fingers._

_“Hey Veronica? I just got back. How’ve you been?”_

_It felt strange to hear a voice like that, open and happy and not stepping on egg shells. She tried to make herself sound calm._

_“Hey Mac.”_

_And obviously failed._

_“Are you okay? You sound weird. All echo-ey.”_

_“I’m in the bathroom.” She whispered. “I didn’t want anyone else to hear me.”_

_A pause._

_“Oooookay, then.”_

_“Look, Mac, I was wondering.” There was just no easy way to say it, so she took a deep breath and rushed her words. “How hard would it be to hack into the coroner’s files and get an autopsy report?”_

_She could practically hear Mac’s interest curling up at the edges._

_“An autopsy report? Whose autopsy report?”_

***

“So, you’re currently in a relationship with Logan?”

“Yes.” Veronica nodded. “Again.”

“A romantic relationship?”

She felt herself frown.

“Yes.”

“Huh.” Dr. Frey looked down at her notes. “Interesting.”

Veronica bristled and her hands curled around the arms of the chair to stop herself fiddling.

“Is there something wrong with that?” Her mouth set in a line. “And before you ask, no, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it.”

“Oh, no, not at all.” It was too casual, the doctor’s voice, and Veronica knew it. She knew it and she fell for the trap anyway. “I just find it interesting you’re dating the son of the man who’s such a cause of pain and fear for you, that’s all.”

She could feel the blood begin to simmer.

“Logan isn’t Aaron.”

It was like a cartoon, with a small dirt road and several feet worth of branches, bright green fern leaves and piled earth clearly signifying where the trap is, and yet the character strolls blithely over it anyway. Veronica continued to walk into it.

“I know that, Veronica, I was wondering if you did, that’s all.”

Her teeth clenched.

“Logan isn’t Aaron. He’s nothing like his father. Shouldn’t you be the one telling me that? Isn’t that what they teach you in psych school? Aaron is a sick, twisted, violent lunatic that gets off on hurting little girls.”

She had to tell herself to breathe, force herself to inhale and exhale.

“Logan’s not like that. He wouldn’t hurt me. He doesn’t get off on causing pain, he’d never…”

_… make me cry. He’d never flaunt my pain in my face. He’d never sleep around for spite. He’d never use innocent girls for his own ends. Logan would never take one of the most horrific events of my life and ridicule me in front of an entire school. He’d never make me a victim in ways that Cassidy never could…_

“Veronica?” It was a loud burst of sound that broke into her conscious. “Veronica, are you alright?”

She shook her head to clear it and set her face into a mask of calm, as if neither of them noticed the tear that inched down her face. Her voice came out in a small squeak.

“Logan could never be Aaron.”

***

_“Veronica?” Logan sighed. “What are you doing?”_

_She smiled into his neck._

_“Did you know your skin tastes like salt and aftershave?”_

_Her knees snuggled closer into his hips and her hands snaked under his arms and around his waist as she settled herself more comfortably on his lap. For his part, Logan kept his hands at her hips and tried to push her back._

_“I don’t normally lick my own neck, so no.”_

_“Yeah?” She brought her head back to look him in the eyes, her mouth curling up into a teasing smile. “Well, you do. What do I taste like?”_

_She watched his eyes close momentarily and a soft little groan escaped his throat._

_“Like someone who needs to get off me.”_

_“You don’t mean that.” The soft, fleshy part of his ear lobe was always sensitive and she knew if she leaned in close and lightly drew her tongue over it, just barely there, that he’d begin to soften. “We have the apartment to ourselves. You, me and a dog who won’t say anything if we keep him in snausages.”_

_“Veronica…”_

_“He likes bacon.”_

_Her lips brushed the tendons that ran down his neck, light little kisses that left goose flesh in their wake. She ground her hips lightly, just enough to make her point as her hands slipped under his shirt and cupped the edges of his ribs._

_“Veronica, come on.” Logan sounded upset. “I’m trying to watch the movie.”_

_She sighed._

_“You’ve seen the movie.” Her plan wasn’t working, so she doubled her efforts, sliding her hands up to trace patterns over his nipples as her mouth left open-mouthed kisses over his jaw. “Several times.”_

_His hands came up to capture her wrists, tugging them out of his clothes._

_“Look, will you stop it?” Her shoulders set squared as he pushed her further back. “We’re not doing this now, okay? Just… not now.”_

_“Why?” She demanded, slinging herself up and off, slumping back into the couch next to him. “Because you think I’m setting up shop in the funny farm?”_

_He turned to look at her and she couldn’t decide whether it looked more like a glare or a plea._

_“You want the short answer, Veronica? Yes. Okay? Yes, that’s exactly why.”_

_Her arms crossed themselves over her chest._

_“I’m not seeing things, Logan.”_

_“No.” The sarcasm practically dripped down his face. “Just dead people. You and Haley Joel Osment should get together sometime.”_

_She didn’t want to cry, she really didn’t, but she wasn’t sure if her brain knew that._

_“Oh, that’s great.” Her voice trembled. “I’m glad someone’s having fun in all this.”_

_He gaped at her, wide mouthed, and something flashed so deep in his eyes that she wished she could take it back._

_“Fun?” The word was spat out. “Jesus Christ, Veronica! Have you looked up the definition lately? Or at all? Because you don’t seem to have any idea what it means!”_

_His hands clenched and he ran them through his hair, catching fistfuls of it. His whole body closed in on itself. She watched him wrestle for control and tried not to show how shallow her breathing had gotten, how the blood in her temples began to pulse._

_Funny, how the smallest things pushed her panic buttons._

_“This isn’t you, Veronica. Can’t you see that? You can’t stand to be in a room by yourself. You won’t even sit in your own car. Someone has to be with you every second of every day. For God’s sake, you’ve got a sleeping bag on your father’s bedroom floor! Someone has to check the bathroom before you’ll even go in. Look me in the eye and tell me that’s sane.”_

_“I know, I know.” When she reached out to him, he sprung from the couch and began to pace back and forth. “Logan, calm down, okay? I know it’s bad.”_

_“Bad? It’s so far past bad, I can’t even…” He stopped pacing to look at her and she could see him deflate; his voice suddenly turning gentle. “You’re convinced my dead father is stalking you. Do you have any idea how much that scares me?”_

_She couldn’t keep running in the same circles, around and around, only to come back to the same place._

_“Not half as much as it scares me, Logan. I’m the one in danger, here, and no one believes me enough to help me do anything about it.”_

_“Do? What are we supposed to do?” He did a double take. “March into the sheriff station and ask for a restraining order on the corpse? I’m sure Lamb would love that. Call Jennifer Love Hewitt? Maybe Dan Akroyd and Bill Murray can come, too. It’ll be a blast.”_

_“Logan…”_

_“I always did like that Slimer dude, but he’d leave a mess all over the tile…”_

_Slowly, her hands came up to rub at her upper arms, just slow enough to suggest comfort rather than anything else. She could feel herself backing away and she didn’t like it. She hated the memory of being alone, but they weren’t giving her much of a choice._

_It was the same song, just a different tune. Stand by her father and lose everything, or pretend she thought he was wrong and keep all her so-called friends. Stand by what she knew was real, or pretend that everyone else was right and she was crazy._

_“If you don’t want to be here, Logan, just go.”_

_The challenge lay heavy between them. There was an expression on his face that hinted at desperation and stunned disbelief, his eyes darted from her to the empty apartment, to the door and back. Too late she realized the ultimatum she’d just placed in his court._

_If he stayed, he’d be pandering to the whims and paranoia he’d been trying to break her out of all week. If he left, he wouldn’t come back._

_She didn’t back down._

***

“So here comes the sixty four thousand dollar question, Veronica. If Aaron Echolls is dead, which you keep insisting, and the dead don’t come back to life, what exactly do you think is happening right now? What other possibilities are there?”

Veronica looked at herself, curled up like a pretzel in the padded chair of the counselor’s office and the sudden thought occurred to her that she looked like a cliché. The worst kind. She carefully extracted all her limbs and sat upright, stretching out into a relaxed position.

“Maybe they’re right.” It was even, the calm voice that escaped. “Maybe I am over tired and seeing things in my sleep.”

There was no answer to that, so she sighed.

“Maybe he didn’t die. Maybe Aaron faked his death and fooled the coroner and his son and has been hiding in wait for months until he could make his move.”

The doctor raised her eyebrow.

“Maybe someone out there really wants to make me think Aaron is back and they’re playing with me.” Her fingers itched to move and she let out a bitter laugh. “You know, maybe I did fall asleep at the wheel that night and ran head first into a truck. Maybe this is Hell.”

Dr. Frey paused for a second, took her glasses off and looked Veronica in the eye.

“Do you want to know what I think?”

For a moment, one brief moment, she thought about saying no. She thought about claiming that she didn’t care what anyone thought, and that was the point, that was why she was here, because she hadn’t capitulated to everyone else telling her to ignore the large man who wanted to kill her.

But she did want to know, so desperately, she wanted to know what this woman, the only person in the last week not to look at her like she crazier than Norman Bates in a post Christmas taxidermy sale, who had sat there and seriously listened to all her stories without once adding commentary, she wanted to know what this woman thought.

Veronica nodded slowly.

“I think your fear is real. I think, given your history, you have genuine reasons to believe that someone would and could target you with such vehemence.”

It wasn’t exactly a rousing declaration of belief and support.

“You’ve spent the last three years of your life in a constant state of agitation, fear, danger and misery. You have been used, abused, hurt, betrayed and abandoned by those you thought you could trust. Now you’ve entered a period in your life where things are resolved, your personal life is stable, and you have a solid support system of people who seem to love you very much.”

And that was that, she steeled herself for the inevitable accusation.

“Veronica? Do you even know how not to be a victim anymore?”

It still hurt.

“So, what?” She laughed, bitter and caustic. “You think I’m making it up, too? You think I’m imagining this big bad wolf to continue some self-hating, sadomasochistic need to punish myself even more?”

She tried to breathe calmly.

“That’s not what I’m saying at all.”

“Oh, really?”

“Do you realize you talk about your life in segments? Quite clear, delineated landmarks of your life. Before and After Lilly’s murder. Before and After Aaron. Before and After the rooftop. It’s interesting to me that you talk about the Before Lilly’s Death time by describing Lilly and Duncan and Logan, even your mother and your father in great detail, but you don’t refer to yourself at all.”

Didn’t she? Veronica was fairly certain she had.

“You don’t appear at all other than to define others. Lilly was your best friend. Duncan was your boyfriend. You only make an appearance in your narrative as a separate entity after Lilly dies. Did you realize that?”

She shook her head.

“I realize the event of her death, those leading up to it and those occurring afterwards, are highly traumatic and life changing, but it’s almost as if you recreated yourself entirely. Your entire life since then was devoted to, and defined by, solving her murder, solving all the mysteries that came your way, finding answers.”

Veronica caught on quickly, her mouth shaping the words before she knew it.

“And now that there are no mysteries…?”

“You don’t have any clear definition of yourself to go by. It’s entirely natural to try and recreate the source of the original pain and tragedy to try and find some…”

“Aaron.” Veronica whispered. “So I am imagining it?”

“I didn’t say that, either.” Dr. Frey leaned forward. “While I do believe you’ve suffered extreme emotional trauma, I don’t for one second believe that you are either delusional or prone to hallucinations. You are as sane, if not more so, than anybody else out there.”

“That doesn’t help me.”

“No.” The doctor sighed, sounding every bit as frustrated as Veronica felt. “No, it doesn’t. I would really like to continue seeing you at regular intervals, I believe you’d benefit greatly from this sort of contact. But I feel that right now, you need to figure out exactly what is happening and who is behind it.”

And that, right there, was the validation that she was looking for and it flowed over her like cool water.

“You have several dedicated people in your life, Veronica, don’t shut them out now just when you need them the most.”

***

The waiting room was empty except for the receptionist behind the desk. Veronica clicked her jaw together as she scanned the room quickly. There was nobody else there, certainly nobody sitting in the green chair flicking through an out dated magazine waiting until she finished so they could escort her home.

Maybe he was in the bathroom.

There was certainly no reason to be suspicious about that. That was logical, that was reasonable. In fact, while she was in the relative safety of company and still free of prying ears and eyes, she had something she wanted to do.

She kept her eyes firmly on the entry doors as she pressed speed dial.

“I’m sorry, did you dial the wrong number?” He sounded slightly bitter and she wasn’t surprised. “’Cause I know you know I ain’t no rich, white boy.”

“Weevil.” There wasn’t time to placate his wounded ego. “I need a favor.”

He chuckled and it didn’t sound happy at all.

“Rein the head tilt in, V. I been home for a month with no word from you. Or did I just happen to miss the welcome home banners? All the party balloons got lost with the streamers, huh?”

He was right; she hadn’t contacted him since he’d been released, but to be fair, he hadn’t contacted her either. If she didn’t stop him, he’d harp on about it until she caved. What he didn’t know was that she had the ultimate way to snap him out of his grudges.

“I need you to get me a gun.”

The word hung like a slap to both of them.

“Huh? Veronica, hang on.” She could hear it in the sudden snap of his voice; he was all hers. “You having a problem with someone? Let me know. But you don’t have to…”

“Can you help me or not?”

She began to count down from five and only got to two.

“I don’t do guns, that’s not my thing and it’s not yours, either.”

“Fine.” She kept her voice crisp and clear and confident, everything she didn’t feel. “I’ll just go somewhere else then. Do you have any names I could look up?”

“Wait, no, hang on.” He rushed in to stop her. “You’re serious about this, aren’t you?”

“You have no idea.” A flash of black caught her eye and she blinked as she watched a man in a business suit walk up to the desk. He was probably the doctor’s next appointment. “Look, I know you don’t do guns, but you know people who do. I need something small, easy to manage, and untraceable.”

A small, nervous cough came over the line.

“You don’t want much, do you?” He sighed. “When can you meet me?”

“I… uh… I can’t.” Before he could protest, she hurried to continue. “Look, I don’t leave the apartment much and there’s someone there with me, twenty four seven, you’ll have to bring it to me. But you can’t let anyone else know, okay? Not Logan, not my dad, no one.”

“Yeah.” It was a deep rumble. “’Cause I was really planning on comparing notes with the Sheriff on this.”

“So, you’ll do it?”

He sighed again.

“Yeah. You owe me for this. You know that, yeah?”

“Big time.” She felt some of the tension ease. “And Weevil? Cheap, cheaper is better.”

Veronica eyed the near empty waiting room and sighed as she made her way to the reception desk.

“Excuse me?” She hoped the shake in her voice sounded as if she was in a hurry and not scared. “Did you happen to see anyone else here? A boy about this high?”

Her hand hovered in mid air in front of the desk.

“You mean the gentleman that came in with you?” The woman asked pleasantly. “He was here, but there was a disturbance downstairs. Something about a car alarm and a tow truck…”

Veronica bit her lip as she brought her phone back up to her ear. It was normal, it could happen; there was nothing suspicious about it, not at all. The phone barely rang twice before he picked up.

“Wallace!” She didn’t wait for him to speak before she hissed, walking away from the desk again. “You were going to be here when I got out.”

“Hey, hey.” To his credit, he sounded sincerely apologetic. “I’m still here, I’m just downstairs. They were going to tow my car, Vee, so unless you wanted to catch the bus home, I have to clear this up.”

That wasn’t out of the realm of possibility, either, but her nerves were beginning to stretch.

“What do you mean ‘have to’, can’t you just fix it then come back up? I’ll wait here in the office.”

He sighed and she could hear the sounds of someone asking him for his license and the rustle of papers.

“It’s only ten floors, Veronica. That’s, what, fifteen seconds? You’re fine in the office, you get on the elevator and count to fifteen, by the time you’re done you’ll be on the ground. I’m just out the front, I can see the elevator doors from here.”

“Wallace…” She didn’t want to beg.

“I’ll stay on the phone with you the whole time, I promise.”

Her chest tightened, but she began to walk towards the elevators anyway.

“You promise?”

“Have I ever let you down?”

The sound of the bell dinging the car’s arrival made her jump.

“Okay.” She breathed in. “Here goes. You still there?”

The sound of his voice chattering in her ear made it bearable to step inside and nod to the group of people standing in a huddle. She turned to the panel of sparsely lit buttons and tried to calculate how many floors would impede the fifteen-second limit.

She didn’t give much in the way of replies, but Wallace didn’t seem to expect her to. He probably realized the absurdity of the conversation that would spill out of her mouth in a crowded elevator. She rested her weight on her left leg and her right knee began to jiggle with impatience as the display slowly changed to show the ninth floor.

And then the eighth.

“You still okay?”

“Yeah.” A strange mix of gasp and pant and whisper. “I’m good. Nearly there.”

The floor shifted under her feet as the car stopped on seven. She crossed the fingers of her right hand and prayed that people were getting on. Quite obviously, she hadn’t been crossing them hard enough and her fingers tightened into a clenched fist as four people pushed past her and left.

She was alone and the walls seemed to stretch in and out again, rolling like a wave.

“Wallace?” Her voice cracked. “I don’t think I can do this, I don’t think…”

Fingers closed around hers on the phone and she stopped breathing as a dial tone sounded in her ear.

“Hello, Veronica.”

 

***  



	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She felt like a little ball with a bell. And this cat had big, sharp claws.

*~*~*~*

_It was reflex in slow motion._

_Her fingers automatically went limp under his, sliding out from his over heated, clammy flesh as her knees buckled and she dipped, catapulting herself as far from him as she could before turning around. The elevator was, perhaps, five feet wide and five feet deep, a small square that seemed large enough to hold a group, but infinitely too small to hold just her and the man who may or may not be her imagination hard at work._

_He laughed, barely moving, as she backed herself against the far wall._

_“Who are you?”_

_Veronica’s chest tightened when his face fell, a dramatic show of angst._

_“Well, now, that’s disappointing. I’d have thought I made a better impression than that.”_

_The display silently ticked down to five and she tried not to look up at it. Wallace’s words echoed in her head. All she had to do was count to fifteen, even less, and they’d be at the ground floor, the doors would open and the crowded lobby would be all she needed._

_She watched as his fingers curled around her phone; juggling it like an experiment. Her hand itched with the loss of it and she could have kicked herself for letting him take it in her rush to get away. The promise of fifteen seconds ebbed away and she tried not to whimper out loud when he reached out to press the red emergency button. Her whole body jerked with the sudden stop just before they hit the fourth floor._

_“You know, Veronica, you make things awfully difficult.”_

_Even though his face was still turned down in mock disappointment, she could see the twinkle in his eyes, the slight air of holding his top lip up from his gums, just waiting to break into a smile. He was enjoying her fear, he always had._

_“Oh, I’m sorry.” She nearly choked on her sudden voice. “Was I supposed to just roll over?”_

_His entire face flinched in surprise before he sucked his cheeks in._

_“Not yet.” Then the grin broke free. “But I’m a very patient man, Veronica, I can wait.”_

_It wasn’t a grand building, just an average, everyday office building. There were no luxuries wasted on trivial things like elevators. As opposed to the Grand, when she had last faced off with him on a somewhat equal footing, the walls of this elevator were not soft and velvety, with textured wood paneling; these walls were thin and cold against her back._

_And the silent lack of piped music thundered like the echo of heavy breathing in the back of her skull._

_“Then don’t hold your breath.” She couldn’t quite believe that she was hissing the words out; that she was standing opposite him, meeting his eyes and antagonizing him. “Because I will never…”_

_“Now, now. Never is such a strong word.” He softly shook his head back and forth. “I seem to remember you telling my lawyers in a particularly heated interview session that I would never walk free. I guess never just isn’t as long as you’d hoped, is it?”_

_Veronica thought back to the doctor’s words, barely half an hour before, and realized that not only was Aaron the source of tragedy in her life, he was the birth of her fear. Most of the horrors of the year before had come after the fact, drenched in sorrow and loss, but she’d never truly had to fear something before he’d hidden in her back seat and given her reason._

_Even when she’d been held down on that pool table, Liam Fitpatrick’s hand closing down around her throat and his face leering above her, she’d known on a deeply cellular level how much a man could and would hurt her. That was Aaron’s handy work; remembered fear from months before. She didn’t think green felt was supposed to smell so much like gasoline._

_“You won’t get away with this.” Her words came out of nowhere. “And you know it. Sooner or later, you’re gonna make a mistake and they’ll all realize you’re still here. I will be there to take you down, count on it.”_

_She wasn’t sure exactly what reaction she’d been hoping for, fear if she was truly deluded, knowledge and realization if she was lucky, perhaps even the weight of what he was doing landing on his face, but whatever she’d been expecting, it wasn’t the spark of glee that flashed in his eyes._

_Logan got the same spark just before he breathed in deep and went on the attack._

_It was the rise to a challenge._

_And it scared her._

_“Face it, nobody’s looking for me.” He sounded almost happy. “They’re too busy watching you to make sure you don’t crack. I could walk right past them on the street and they wouldn’t blink.”_

_Her fact must have twitched, because he leaned back with satisfaction._

_“Isn’t that why you’re here, Veronica? Seeing one of the highest priced therapists money can buy?” She had to suppress the shudder when he winked at her. “And I know exactly how high priced, she’s on my payroll after all.”_

_No._

_No goddamned way._

_“That’s a little hard, isn’t it?” She wasn’t sure exactly how her voice wasn’t breaking down, because her insides felt like they were quivering at a million miles per second. “Given that you’re dead and you don’t have any money?”_

_He only sighed at her and she felt like a little ball with a bell. And this cat had big, sharp claws._

_“Unfortunately, if I was going to truly enjoy my freedom, Aaron Echolls had to die. Aaron Echolls would have been hounded by the media, Hollywood, fans, stalkers.” He nodded his head and winked. “You. Think about it, Aaron Echolls wouldn’t have had any true freedom. But I, Veronica, I am still here.”_

_She hugged her arms in close to her body._

_“Not for long.”_

_“Bring it on, little girl.” He chuckled, deep and throaty, and stepped towards her. “Tell me, exactly how much money would it take to shut your mouth?”_

_Her jaw dropped._

_“Are you…?” Nausea rose in her belly. “Are you trying to bribe me for my silence? Why would you go to all this trouble to convince me you’re alive and then try to bribe me? That doesn’t make sense. Even for you.”_

_Another step._

_“Just call me an interested party. We’ve already established I’m paying off your shrink, at least, whether you believe it or not, you won’t trust her again and that’s enough for me. I think we can all safely say that I paid off those twelve fine, upstanding jurors; so really, anyone can be bought. How much, Veronica?”_

_The skin on her arms prickled where her nails dug in._

_“There is no amount of money in the world.” Her teeth ground down hard on each other and she could practically feel the enamel wearing off. “You can’t buy me, Aaron.”_

_She hated the way his eyes swept her up and down, as if savoring the moment. As if savoring her._

_“And that…” His tongue poked out to swipe at his bottom lip as he closed the distance between them. “…is why I’m here.”_

***

“Miss?” She blinked when she head the voice. “Miss, are you okay? Do you need help?”

Veronica looked up, a little dazed, before she realized she was sitting on the elevator floor, crouched down low in the corner with her arms hugging her knees. She breathed in deep, sucked all the tears and snot back, and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.

“Yeah.” Her voice was as shaky as her wrist as she pulled herself up. “Yeah, I’m fine. No help.”

The doors were open. Aaron was gone. And she was making a scene.

“Are you sure?” A hand came to land on her shoulder, gentle and soothing. “You don’t look…”

“I’m fine.” She snapped.

The man was thin and wiry and short, he had wire-rimmed glasses and a briefcase clutched to his side. His face seemed to flinch at her voice. She almost felt guilty.

“I’m sorry.” She assured him with a sniff. “Really, I’m fine.”

When she stepped out of the elevator, it felt like cool air rushing into her lungs, like finally being able to breathe after being deprived. Her eyes searched the lobby and she found Wallace quickly. He was having a heated argument with a security guard and gesturing towards the elevator doors.

She made it to him in seconds, wrapping her arms around him and melting into the feel of his arms closing around her. Wallace smelled like sandalwood, cookies and the faint lingering scent of grape soda. His fingers were warm and soft against the cusps of her shoulder blades, quite the opposite of blank, cold walls.

“Geez, woman, don’t do that to me…” His voice trailed off, suddenly falling. “Hey. Hey, Veronica, you’re shaking, are you okay?”

The sound that came out was little more than a muffled groan of sorts, but she supposed the nod against his collar was sufficient.

“Hey man.” He said it over her head. “Sorry to bother you, I guess it’s all good now.”

“Wait.” She twisted around to look at the guard, feeling the sudden and familiar thrill of knowledge and purpose. “I need your security footage for that elevator.”

***

“Ok, we’re here.”

Like she really needed to be told. Granted, she might be somewhat emotionally hysterical, but she could still see through a glass windshield and feel when Wallace had pulled the car to a stop. She stretched her spine around the seat and reached for the hat on the back seat.

“Showtime, then.”

Wallace grinned at her as she shuffled her hair into a non-obtrusive twist, curled down around her nape and under her shirt.

“What?” She finally asked. “You keep looking at me. What?”

“Nothin’.” He kept grinning. “Just… welcome back, is all.”

Her answer was a small, shaky smile.

“One more thing?” Maybe a head tilt thrown in for good measure, if he was going to be really nostalgic. “Can you call my dad and tell him we’re running late? I don’t know how long this is going to take.”

“Where’s your phone?” Wallace just had to be reasonable. “Wouldn’t it be better if you called him?”

Her throat closed up.

“It’s… uh…” She stumbled for the first time since she’d taken charge. “It’s in my pocket.”

There were only about three hundred different questions in the puzzled look he gave her at that, but she tried to smile and he let it go. She made a mental note to bake him more cookies.

“Here, your hair’s doing a thing…”

It was innocent, completely innocent, the way he reached out to her, she knew that, but she couldn’t stop herself flinching, couldn’t stop her hand coming up and slapping his arm away. Hard. The sound of skin on skin echoed between them.

“Just…” It was a wince of an apology. “Just don’t touch my neck.”

His list of questions quadrupled in front of her eyes and she felt herself bowing under the pressure.

Veronica busied herself scanning the printed pages in front of her. She’d dragged Wallace out of that office building and directed him straight to his house so she could look something up and print it. Exactly what she needed. And as much as she was able to con most people into giving her what she wanted, she had the distinct impression that the less she was recognized during this mission, the better. So she’d also gotten one of Alicia’s caps that Wallace promised wasn’t used that often and wouldn’t be missed.

She really needed to air out her costume wardrobe when they got back to the apartment.

She left him standing in clear sight by the car and entered the large store. It was big and wholly unmemorable, there was very little personality. Just a gray carpet and gray shelves lined up in regular patterned rows, brightly colored signs advertising different sections and a thousand different DVD covers that all seemed to blend in together.

“You seriously think this is gonna work?” He asked when he finally caught up with her. “And does Mac know about all the movies you’re going to make her watch tonight?”

“Well.” Veronica’s eyes were wide and innocent. “She knows we’re watching movies. And I’ll make popcorn to distract her.”

Wallace whistled.

“That’s a lot of popcorn.”

They walked up to the counter and she plastered on a bright smile.

“Hey!” The guy behind the counter blinked at them wearily and she just smiled even harder as she held out their list. “We were wondering if you could help us out…?”

But she was cut off when the guy just nodded and began typing into the keyboard in front of him. His nametag read Stanley.

“Uh, yeah. No problems.” He yawned. “We got most of them in. It’s become a thing, you know?”

Beside her, Wallace hid his grimace well. He had no idea what she was doing, he never did, but he was getting a lot better at faking it, at just going with the flow. She could still see him shaking his head as she printed out her list, -- _for what possible reason could you want this?_ \-- his face a mask of doubt and confusion.

“Yeah.” Wallace nodded emphatically, not even a trace of the confusion she knew was in there. “Can’t wait.”

“So, like…” Veronica tilted her head to the side. “Lots of people do it, huh?”

Another yawn from Stanley. Apparently, Stanley was very enthusiastic about his job.

On the inside.

“Aaron Echolls marathon? Yeah, guy’s like a gold mine to DVD rentals, you know? Beating a murder rap and then getting murdered?” He screwed up his face a little as he looked closer at her list. “Wow, you’ve done your research. Most people go ‘The Long Haul’ and all the big movies he did after that, but you guys’ve got everything. This one? He wasn’t in it for more than five minutes… Not sure if we’ve got that…”

“That’s okay.” Veronica continued to smile. “Whatever you’ve got is fine.”

“Yeah, ‘kay.” Stanley made notes on a pad of paper. “Gimme ten minutes, I’ll round up what we’ve got.”

***

There were only two cars parked outside of the office and she recognized both of them. Hell, Helen Keller would recognize the X-Terra blocks away. She felt like tap dancing all the way into the office, loudly giving them both what for and a few dozen I-told-you-so’s thrown in for good measure.

Somehow, Veronica was fairly sure her father wouldn’t be too happy about her bursting her lungs midway into the neener neener song in front of a client who had managed to park a block down the street, just to prove how crazy she really wasn’t.

Fortunately, there were only two voices in the office; two voices that matched the two cars. Logan and Keith.

“Dad!” They stopped talking when she rushed in, quickly followed by Wallace. “Dad, look!”

She saw it in the way their faces blanched, the way Logan’s hands immediately went to his back pockets the way he did when he was trying not to reveal something, the way her dad casually closed a file on his desk and left it there, the way he always did when he tried to misdirect her attention.

They were hiding something that most likely had to do with her, something that would most likely be very difficult to sneak back into the office to look at, if she couldn’t work up enough courage to leave the room by herself, let alone the apartment.

Damn her paranoia. It was really cramping her style.

“What is it, honey?”

She held up the tape.

“We’ve got him. Aaron’s on the tape.” Her fingers tightened momentarily before she released it, before she let Keith take it out of her hand. “I told him he’d make a mistake and he did, coming after me in a public building.”

And maybe there was a better way to handle it, a somewhat more subtle approach than storming right in and announcing to the very people worried witless about her that she’d been attacked for the third time in the space of a week.

Certainly she should have paid attention to the way Logan had stepped forward, face falling when she hadn’t looked at him first, or even at all, hadn’t given him the news. His hands grasped her shoulders and spun her around to face him.

“What do you mean he came after…?”

Veronica could joke all she wanted with Wallace as they giggled and plotted and played capers in video stores all around town, she could smile and make as many plans as she wanted, pretending that she was just fine and that it was nothing more than another day in any other week in her life.

Except that it wasn’t.

And she couldn’t stop the little mewl of fear as she twisted out of his hands before she could stop herself, her heartbeat suddenly amping up unbearably loud and fast, pulsing so hard in her chest she thought her ribs were going to split from the pressure.

“Veronica... I…”

He drew back as if burned, his face flooding with red penitence, fear and shame.

“Logan…”

But there was nothing she could say.

“What happened?”

Keith’s voice rang out loud and firm and, just as she was about to roll her eyes at him for not paying as close attention as he usually would, given that she’d already answered his question, she noticed that he was looking over her shoulder.

At Wallace.

“I didn’t see it.” Wallace looked at the ground, his face already twisted in guilt. “She was only alone for a second. It happened so fast. But there was someone…”

He gestured weakly at the tape in Keith’s hand. It seemed to spur them into movement, Keith moving towards the television and player, setting it up as they all crowded around it. An image flickered to life on the screen.

She already knew what they were going to say. The resolution of the tape was sketchy at best, fuzzy little black and white pixels arranged to create shapes that resembled people scurrying about the foyer of the office building.

“They didn’t…” She cut off any questions before they began. “They didn’t have any working cameras in the elevator, but you can see him here…”

Her hand pointed to a figure walking across the lobby. Logan’s eyes were greedy as he held his breath, flickering over the image and trying to press forward, as if to convince himself one way or the other.

“He’s tall enough.” Keith titled his head, squinting to get a better look. “It looks like he has the right build.”

It wasn’t a resounding confirmation, but it was probably a better reaction than the outright disbelief they’d been tossing at her all week, even if he was just humoring her. They watched without further comment as Veronica used the remote to forward the tape, the little figures in the lobby speeding up and rushing past.

“There.” She slowed the tape to normal speed. “That’s Wallace going to his car now.”

From the conversation in the car earlier, she knew that there was probably five minutes, give or take, between Wallace leaving the elevator and Aaron’s grand exit. She didn’t know exactly what to expect from this angle, she wasn’t sure if she knew what it had looked like from the other side; she’d been a little distracted at the time.

Every time the doors opened on the screen in front of them, they all leaned forward, holding their breaths.

“Wait…” Her eyes narrowed at the screen, a growing crowd around the door that had opened. “That’s me. He must have…”

Her fingers gripped the remote tightly as she bit her lip, rewinding the tape frame by frame, until the doors had closed again. Then she pressed play. The same dark figure as before walked out of the doors, casually slipping into the crowd. He didn’t look up, didn’t even face the cameras at any turn.

She pressed rewind again.

And pause.

“Veronica.” Her fingers loosened and she let Keith take the remote out of her hand. “Honey, the tape isn’t clear at all.”

“But he was there! He… he…” Her voice trailed off when she caught the tears that prickled the back of her throat. “It was him. Logan, tell them it’s him!”

She could feel him tense next to her, with a clenched jaw and hands that gripped the outer edges of his arms, fingers pinching in tightly. She felt like telling him it was okay to reach out and touch her, but she didn’t and she could practically smell night air and rooftop tar exuding from his pores.

“I don’t know.” He finally said through clenched teeth. “It might be, but it might not be.”

It was stupid and foolish to have gotten her hopes up. She should have known exactly how they were going to react. It was a foregone conclusion, previous experience should have told her that. Regardless, there was no amount of ‘under’ that covered her ‘whelm’.

It was one thing for them to hear her describe her possibly delusional experiences; it was another thing entirely for them to witness the perpetrator on film and still not believe her.

“Why can’t you just trust me?” But her voice wasn’t in it, flat and robbed of all emotion. “Why?”

She was too tired to care all of a sudden.

“While I seriously doubt this man is the recently buried Aaron Echolls.” Keith cupped her chin in both hands and looked her straight in the eye. “It is highly suspicious for someone to just walk away from a young girl in enough emotional distress to warrant the attention of everyone else.”

Keith pressed the play button on the remote and they all watched as the grainy figure slipped out of the elevator doors and was immediately replaced by several other people.

“What are you saying?” Wallace ventured.

Keith played the tape again, leaning even closer to get a better look.

“It’s worth looking into.”

She should be relieved that they were starting to take her seriously, but it seemed like a long shot all of a sudden and she was already beginning to suspect that no matter what they did, or how many precautions they took, it wouldn’t be anywhere near enough. Aaron had gotten to her three times already and he would most likely get to her again.

The only way she was going to feel safe again was when she had her own gun and knew how to shoot it.

***

“Veronica? What am I doing, exactly?”

She looked up from the file, mouth not quite able to close fully.

“Huh?”

Mac sighed and idly threw a kernel of popcorn at her. Veronica allowed herself a smile as she reached out and easily caught it a foot in front of her face. She was curled into the armchair, her track pants and tank top feeling more comfortable than anything she’d worn all week. Mac was sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of the couch, her right hand sifting patterns into Backup’s fur.

“Indulging in cheesy 70s epics?”

Another sigh was accompanied by an eye roll.

“Grease is about as cheesy as I want my 70s movies, Veronica, but this?” Mac made a disgusted face. “This is just torture.”

Veronica clicked her tongue as her eyes focused back down to the coroner’s report in her hand and the photos that had accompanied it.

“I want details.” She gestured to the list sitting on the arm of the chair. “We need to cross reference the names of his characters with any corresponding identities on the P.I. website, bank accounts, properties, that sort of thing.”

There was a pause for several seconds before Veronica looked up to find Mac looking at her with a raised eyebrow.

“That still doesn’t explain why I’m actually sitting here watching this drivel. Don’t you have the list of names already?”

“Yes.” She nodded as she read the words in the report again. Unmistakable and clear and definite. “A list of character names and about fifty of them have multiple matches. If we can narrow it down, get more information about the characters, hobbies, family, that sort of thing…”

Mac straightened her back.

“You really think he’d be that obvious?”

“Please.” Veronica rolled her eyes. “That man hasn’t had an original thought in his head since I’ve known him.”

Her fingers shook slightly as she stared down at the bloody corpse, the jagged edges of the gunshot wound and the slightly marbled grayish blue flesh. She couldn’t take her eyes away from the gaping chasm of skin and red drenched flesh, several stark white hunks of bone suggested the placement of a skull at some point.

“Wouldn’t…?” The hesitant shake in Mac’s voice captured Veronica’s attention if not her gaze. “Wouldn’t Logan know all this stuff? Better than me?”

She’d be lying if she said that the question didn’t make her nervous, but to be honest, Veronica had been expecting it a lot earlier; she certainly would have asked it if she’d been Mac. On several levels it made sense.

“He doesn’t watch his dad’s movies.”

And she left it at that.

“You really think it’s him?”

There was a quiet hush to Mac’s voice, one that told her Mac had both dropped her line of Logan questions and also picked up her eagerness to pound the final nails in Aaron’s coffin. She wasn’t sure if it was because Mac really believed her, or because Mac just wanted to believe her, which was two different things.

“I do. I’m going to prove it.” Her mouth set as she eyed the autopsy report for a final time. “And you’re going to help me.”

***

_It happened in a split second, his grip on her elbow, the gush of air that rushed into her lungs and the wall that sped up to meet her face as she was spun around._

_“You think you’re so smart, Veronica. You think you’re invincible.” Her breath pumped out against the wall, hot as it echoed back on her cheek. “But you’re not, you’re really not. That’s something I promise you and believe me, unlike you, I keep my promises.”_

_Her right shoulder strained hard where Aaron had her arm pinned, her breath jagged and the skin of her back itched to slide right off her skeleton where he pushed into her. She could feel the blunt curve of his knee behind hers, the slightest increase of pressure and she’d stumble. His hand felt hot and greasy on the wrist he held behind her back._

_“What?” She managed to gasp it out through clenched teeth. “What promi…?”_

_“You don’t even know.” It was a growl, a deep, dangerous sound against the side of her neck. “That makes you the worst kind of tease, doesn’t it? Didn’t Keith ever teach you not to lead the Big Bad Men on?”_

_Maybe he was the delusional one. Maybe he’d started to believe his own stories, the convoluted lies that he and his lawyers had created and spun, the way they’d torn her down inside the courtroom._

_“I don’t know…” A small cry escaped her throat when he pushed harder on her arm and stretched her shoulder even more. “I don’t know what you’re…”_

_He laughed through his nose; a jet stream of heated air that made her shiver._

_“Sure you do. You found the cameras.”_

_The words sent little explosions off in her head. She must have made some sort of sound; a small gasp of shock, because he laughed, low and throaty._

_“You remember that night, don’t you, Veronica? The way you all but threw yourself at my son?”_

_“We didn’t…” Shock made her struggle, the instant desire to clear her name, if only to him. “Nothing happened.”_

_“Oh, don’t I know it?” His mouth was so close to her neck she could feel the hiss of air as it dragged past his teeth. “I must have watched those videos time and time again in the week before my unfortunate arrest. They worked wonders with the pause button, Veronica, let me tell you.”_

_Her brain wasn’t going to stop to give itself time to catch up with the situation; she didn’t want to think about or register any of his words. Not one._

_“You didn’t see anything.” And she wasn’t sure whether or not she was trying to convince him or herself. “The cameras weren’t even on.”_

_He was quick to correct her._

_“The monitors might not have been on, but the cameras were.”_

_And that was too much, because nobody knew. Nobody had been there and she certainly hadn’t told anyone what she’d found and how. She flinched when she felt his free hand slide over the skin of her shoulders._

_“And I watched you take your jacket off, I can still remember the red shirt underneath, Veronica.” His hand lifted off the skin of her back; all except one finger, which trailed all the way down her spine, taking care to emphasize each knob of bone hurdled. “How it rode up, I remember the tight little jeans you wore.”_

_She shook her head to dislodge his words, even as his finger played with the top of her jeans, the divot in the small of her back. Her body tightened, trying to get away from his grasp as she felt his hand slide around her waist._

_“A little tighter than these ones, of course, or I wouldn’t be able to do this.” She bit down on her cheek as something slid into her front pocket, obscenely intimate. “You should be careful with your phone, you don’t want to lose it.”_

_He lingered too long, too familiar, and she literally couldn’t breathe anymore. Her lungs felt like they were going to burst inside her chest as her throat closed up and her stomach began to grind in on itself over and over._

_“Most of all.” His voice sounded delighted, as if he was savoring the memory, and that very thought was enough to bring bile up in her throat. “I remember your hair.”_

_The hand finally left her pocket, but she wasn’t granted any reprieve as he began combing fingers through the aforementioned hair. She didn’t want to realize that he was parting it down the middle, didn’t want to think about it at all._

_“Those two little pigtails on either side and your pink little neck showing between them.” And she really didn’t want to imagine that the warm, wet slide that had the skin crawling at the nape of her neck was his tongue. “It was shorter then, of course, but we can work with that. You make a better schoolgirl than Lilly ever did, I must say.”_

_She bit down on her tongue and tried not to whimper or struggle any more than she already had._

_“Speaking of, there’s one thing I think you really should have learned from Lilly.” His voice backed away slightly and she felt cold air behind her head. “You might be able to cuckold my son, dangle his balls from your string while you screw with every other boy in the vicinity, but you can’t do that with me, Veronica.”_

_The sound of the elevator beginning its decent broke into her conscious and Veronica opened her eyes, trying to look around. The small flash of lighted display she could see changed from a three to a two and she tensed._

_With a sudden, violent jerk as the bell announced the arrival in the lobby, he thrust her against the far wall and she had to throw her arms out in front of her just to avoid slamming face first into the ground. Her knees hit the ground with a crunch and she let herself sink down as the doors opened._

_By the time she looked up, it wasn’t Aaron looking down at her._

 

***  



	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She thought her death meant something. But all it meant was that she was crazy.

*~*~*~*

_She can’t move, her limbs are like lead and they ignore every signal her brain tries to scream at them._

_“So how are you, Veronica?”_

_The voice stops her, makes her blood run cold, and she wants to cry. She’s looking right at him and not even her neck will move, eyes trained on the side of his weathered, tanned face as he drives the car to what is supposed to be her apartment complex. Her hands lie limply in her lap and she’s mentally screaming at them to move, to open the door, to do something._

_Anything._

_“Oh, don’t be.” He chuckles, as if she answered him, as if there wasn’t anything wrong with this picture. “I was a teenager once.”_

_Aaron turns his eyes on her and there’s such a deep gleam in them she tastes bile in her throat._

_“The thing I want to ask is how’s Logan?”_

_It’s exactly how it played out that day. Inside her head, she’s screaming. Loud, insistent, and panicked, trying to call attention to herself. Low, deep and angry, yelling at him to stop the car, to let her go, blaming him for everything he did. To Lilly, to Logan, to her._

_Not a sound comes out of her throat, not even a whimper._

_“Your secret’s safe with me.” He taps his nose, smirking just a little too hard. “Look, I just appreciate whatever you’re doing to help him through it.”_

_The car slows down and she can feel the wheels crunch to a stop underneath her. Aaron looks over expectantly. The only movement of her body is the crawling feeling that skitters all over her skin. He raises an eyebrow and gestures at her to get out._

_Suddenly a grin spreads over his face._

_“Oh, right.” He breaks character for one brief second to wink at her, exaggerated and playful as if they’re conspiring together. “I forgot, here, let me help.”_

_She doesn’t have any choice but to sit and watch him open his door, step out of the car and casually walk around to her side. He’s whistling as he does it, as if this is just some jolly old errand. The car shakes when he opens her door._

_Veronica can’t even close her eyes when he slides his hand down the side of her hip to unbuckle her belt._

_“I’m glad you two are together.” Back in character, he whispers it into the side of her neck as he pulls her legs out of the seat, pushing his other hand behind her shoulders as his eyes travel the length of her. “I like what I see in him when he’s with you.”_

_Air flows around her as she’s lifted up, hoisted into his arms like a sack of flour that weighs nothing. Everything is moving slowly, like they’re under water, drifting through thick, sludgy currents. One of his arms cradles her shoulders against his chest and the other lies under her knees, his wrist wrapped up around the curve of her thigh until his fingers splay obscenely over the top and she can’t do a thing about it._

_The skirt of her dress flutters below, the undersides of her thighs are bared, and she swallows desperately when she recognizes the color white. She’s in a white dress and a thin black belt circles her waist as she’s jostled against him. The choker around her neck begins to live up to its name and tightens painfully._

_She wants to scratch at it, scratch at him, but she’s motionless, static, still._

_Drugged._

_“You are home.”_

_His voice changes timber as they enter through the glass doors of a room she recognizes to be the burnt down pool house. One moment he sounds like Dick and the next like Sean._

_“See? There’s your pool and your hot tub and your big mansion...”_

_She feels a soft mattress sigh underneath her when he lowers her down, large thick blankets and fluffy pillows surrounding her like cotton clouds. A low-pitched, breathy giggle sounds off to the side and Aaron grins down at her._

_“And here’s a hot foreign exchange student who’s been living with your family. Now, I know you’ve had your eye on her and that’s okay.”_

_Veronica wants to close her eyes._

_“Check you out, Veronica Mars, you’re like a rocker chick now.”_

_Lilly’s face appears above her, eyes heavily ringed in mascara and lips pouty red. There’s laughter inside her eyes and bubbling out of her mouth. Veronica doesn’t want to feel the soft hand down the side of her face, she really doesn’t, what she wants to do is cry._

_“I have a secret.” Lilly whispers down to her, mouth closing in on her ear. “A good one.”_

_She wants out, she wants to scream, and she wants to throw up. Not necessarily in that order._

_“Come here, lover.” Lilly says, looking back over her shoulder at Aaron. “Time to earn your keep.”_

_The ceiling is burnt out and shaded black, but there’s a fan spinning above them and Veronica can see the glitter of a camera peeking out of the middle, the lens reflecting the figures on the bed: Lilly, in her green shorts and tight top, Aaron kneeling in front of her and wrapping his arm around her waist to pull her in for a deep kiss._

_And herself, immobile and discarded like a broken doll in the middle of the bed between them, their knees poking into either side of her ribs._

_“You know.” Aaron’s voice has returned as his hand slips down to play at the strap of Veronica’s dress. “I can see why the two of you were such good friends. You’re so much alike.”_

_Lilly reaches down and pulls a bright pink pen from the middle of Veronica’s cleavage, giggling as she unscrews the top and pulls out a piece of paper._

_“It’s a spy pen!” She claims with glee, unwrapping the message. “I’m gonna use it to pass secret messages to all of my lovahs!”_

_Written across the paper are the words ‘If you wanna be my friend, you gotta get with my lovers’._

_Aaron growls._

_“I am not playing with you.”_

_Lilly giggles again, flipping her hair over her shoulder._

_“Oh, really. Well, you’re usually very interested in playing with me.”_

_Beneath them, Veronica has no choice but to watch Aaron backhand Lilly and little drops of blood land on her abdomen Above them, far in the distant, star filled blackened sky, a loud explosion goes off, spilling bits of orange and gold down like rain._

_“You couldn’t do this the easy way?” And Veronica thinks if she could move, there’d be tears running down her cheeks, because after everything, hearing Beaver’s voice out of Aaron’s mouth makes her heart clench. “You know Aaron Echolls is staying here. What do you want to bet that I can get him convicted for the death of this teenage girl?”_

_“Oh yeah.” Lilly yawns and sits down on her heels, one hand scratching patterns into her shoes. Light blue with little hearts, solid pink and hollow ones all over, and Logan’s name inside a larger heart. “Now that’s just creepy.”_

_“Veronica?” Aaron is himself again, bundling her up in his arms and lifting her off the bed. “You’re an odd duck.”_

_The air turns chilly and constricted as she’s lowered down into a small, confined space. Short walls rise up only far enough to cover her body, knees bent at an awkward angle as Aaron settles her arms down, resting her wrists on the top of her blood sticky belly._

_It’s a fridge and her fear bites heavy._

_“You wanna know something about Joan of Arc, Veronica? Huh? God didn’t really talk to her.” He kicks the edges of the fridge, the sound echoing loudly in the small space around her. “Uh-huh. It’s true; I saw it on T.V. You know, it was one of those historical forensics programs.”_

_The gas comes out of nowhere, curling in fumes around her open coffin in the pool house shell._

_Veronica tries to scream again._

_“And they decided she had a brain tumor. Burned alive. What a waste. She thought her death meant something.” He leans over the top of the fridge and all she can see is his face and a lone flickering match against the backdrop of a black sky lit with little round falling faces of her father. “But all it meant was that she was crazy.”_

_Her dry throat scratches as she tries again and again, attempting to force her very cells into movement by willpower and fear alone. Her brain screams the word no, over and over again, no, no, no, no._

_It happens in slow motion, the flame licking at the little matchstick as it tumbles down and down, end over end, landing on her chest. It dances for a split second, lighting up the shadows of the box she’s in, illumination licking at the deep scent of earth and decay that clings to the sides._

_And then the pain starts._

_Finally, a scream forms and deafens her as heat slices her skin, flames burning a deep hole right through her ribs to her heart, wrapping tight fingers around her and eating the very hairs from her head. Black smoke pours out of her open mouth and flames lick at her eyeballs, her blood begins to boil in her veins as her skin crisps and tightens around her flesh, turning black._

_Lilly laughs in the background and Veronica screams until her lungs burst._

***

“Veronica!”

She pulled away from the hands that clawed at her. Gasping.

“Veronica, it’s me!”

Slowly, she opened her eyes and found herself cowering underneath the desk in her bedroom, frantically clawing the underside of the wood as she tried to get away. She took deep breaths and tried to calm the frantic birdbeat of her heart as she focused on the worried face of her father crouched down in front of her.

“Huh.” Her voice shook, cracking out of a dry throat as she lowered her hands. “Sorry. Uh, bad dream, I guess.”

Her right hand hovered over her belly and she told herself she wasn’t looking for stray spots of blood, even as her fingers pushed into the skin, swarmed over the nauseatic ripples of her stomach and pushed, digging her nails in. She told herself she certainly wasn’t trying to –create—any.

“Veronica.” Her dad sighed and extended a hand. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

She blew a raspberry, soft and weak and brittle.

“Yeah.” But she didn’t think she could have convinced a first grader with that performance, let alone her dad or herself. “Of course, I’m just… squished.”

Her joints protested when she stretched her legs and hips and shoulders out from the desk, letting him pull her out and to her feet. His eyes were worried and reddened with lack of sleep and there were wrinkles in the sides of his eyes that she was sure hadn’t been there before. Her head spun as she stood still.

“Must’ve been some dream.” He said it quietly. “Wanna talk about it?”

She could feel all the blood drain away from her face.

“Ah, no, not really.” She was fairly sure he could feel her shaking. Violent, uncontrollable tremors that ran through her. “I wasn’t too loud, was I?”

“Not especially.”

The sleep slurry voice sounded from the doorway and she looked up to see Logan leaning against the wood, his bleary eyes focused on her. Behind him, she could see Wallace peering in.

Yeah, this whole sleeping in her own room just didn’t pan out as well as she thought it would.

They closed ranks around her after seeing the videotape. She knew none of them particularly believed the Aaron claim, but they were taking the whole strange figure in the elevator situation very seriously.

There were two sleeping bags in the living room that spent the day rolled up and squished under the corner table, and several large bags of clothing that overflowed in the bathroom and her dad’s room and, occasionally, hers.

For the first two nights, she’d slept in the living room with Logan and Wallace, forced onto the couch while they battled for room on the floor with the dog. It was a slumber party with very little slumber involved. Veronica would lie awake staring at the ceiling and trying not to fall asleep, because sleep meant nightmares and nightmares meant waking everyone else up.

It was beginning to be ridiculous, made even more so because they’d all stopped pointing out to her how ridiculous she was actually being. So she’d taken a deep breath and forced herself back into her own room. Her dad had a gun, which was common knowledge, Backup never left her side and Logan and Wallace were added protection.

They’d nailed her bedroom window, and every other window in the apartment, closed and Mac and Wallace had wired it with an alarm. As long as someone scoped out the room before she went in, Veronica had felt fairly sure she’d be safe.

Apparently her subconscious didn’t agree.

“I’m just…” Her wrist gestured weakly back to the bed as she eye rolled an apology to the group. “I should try to get more sleep.”

“I bags the space in front of the couch!” Wallace announced quickly.

“Hey!” Logan flared, turning around. “No way, the space in front of the door has a draft.”

Keith just sighed.

“I’ll find your turtle bag, sweetie.”

Veronica couldn’t argue.

***

She lay staring at the ceiling, her eyes watery and feeling slightly smoky.

The acrid scent of gasoline was expelled from her lungs with every exhalation, but she could still feel each separate tongue of flame that had caressed her, feel the way her toes had curled into themselves. If she even closed her eyes she could see them.

And it wasn’t Aaron that worried her, because dreams about him were expected, she could deal with them. She was prepared for them. She’d even expected the Cassidy cameos and explosion repeats, because she’d had them repeatedly since it happened. But not Lilly. And not Lilly like that. She knew it wasn’t real, but it shook her anyway.

Goddamnit.

“Logan?” It was a small whisper, barely even a breath.

“Yeah?”

Thick and muffled in the half dark, their words held no meaning; they weren’t real.

“Lilly was a good person, wasn’t she?”

She saw him sit up out of the corner of her eye and knew he was looking at her intently. It was a slow count to five, almost six, before he moved. He crawled out of the sleeping bag in slinky rustles, a shadow on the wall in the slatted light that peeked in through the blinds.

“Extra special bad dream, huh?”

Quietly, almost silently, he climbed over the arm of the couch and crawled up into the space next to her body, pulling her flush against him. She buried her face in his neck and he swept her hair back. Her body trembled and he ran hands up and down her arms to settle her.

“Of course she was good.” A whispered promise into her hair. “Stupid sometimes, but good.”

His heart thundered into her ear and she let herself match it, steadied her breathing to the rise and fall of his chest.

“Then why?” It wasn’t fair to ask, not of him, but she couldn’t stop it, couldn’t help the words tumbling out even as his body tensed. “Why… with your dad? After everything?”

It wasn’t as if there was a great many people left to ask. There was nobody left who would know. The world had once seemed peopled with those who mourned Lilly, devastated and shattered, and now their number was dwindling.

He pulled her closer, wrapped his arms around her back, sleeping bag and all, and just breathed for a long time.

“Do you remember when she first got her license and she wanted to drive us all to the beach?”

Veronica smiled, despite herself.

“She hit a gull.” It was sudden, the flood of memories, of warmth. “And cried.”

Logan sniffed above the top of her head.

“She bought a stupid little coffin for the thing and made me bury it.”

They both almost laughed at the memory, shared little gusts of air.

“And made us wear black.”

“That...” She felt his lips soft on her forehead. “… was Lilly Kane. Bad people don’t do shit like that, Veronica, I think she was just messed up. She just never got a chance to make up for it.”

They were soft and quiet and still and Veronica leaned up to kiss him on the mouth.

“Thank you, Logan, I needed to hear that.”

“Wow, memories sure are fun.” A third voice sounded, louder and more awake than them. “But if I hear the sound of mutant ninja zipper, I’m gettin’ Mr. Mars, some of us are trying to sleep here.”

Veronica grinned and settled back into Logan’s arms.

***

“I’m lodging a formal protest.” Logan turned and leaned his hip against the outdoor table. “This is not manly men’s work.”

Veronica smiled sweetly.

“Sure it is. Just, you know, grunt when you separate the whites from the colors.” Her eyelashes fluttered as she clasped her hands to her chest. “You’re both so dreamy. My heroes.”

“Yeah.” Wallace wasn’t above frowning or pouting. “Somehow I just don’t see Kevin Costner sitting around with lavender scented dryer sheets.”

“Look.” She spun around, arms up and palms out as she walked backwards towards the open door. “Being a bodyguard is more than just cool swords and guns, you know.”

“I don’t see no women, either.” Wallace rolls his eyes. “Where’s my hot, grateful honey?”

It was miniscule, probably not worth noticing by any casual observer, but she could feel them both watching, even as they pretended to be casual about it. They’d thoroughly searched the laundry room in and out, and the only access was the door, which they were all parked outside. The only other possible entry was a small window that a cat would have trouble fitting through, let alone a bulky man.

She didn’t let down her guard, though, because that was all it took.

“Besides.” She grinned. “It’s simple math. There’s only two more people in the apartment and yet, somehow, five times as much laundry. You’re gonna help, whether you like it or not.”

As soon as she had a foot in the door, Veronica turned and ducked down between the washer and the dryer. Packed deep, hidden behind a discarded old rag, sat a box of laundry detergent. She nodded in relief as she picked it up, hefting its weight.

She cast a quick glance out to the boys who were still grumbling good-naturedly and then fumbled with the lid, digging her fingers into the coarse powder. They touched on a small plastic baggie and she quickly covered it up again, spreading the detergent liberally.

“There is a god!” She announced loudly. “That detergent I left behind last week is still here.”

“Well, yeah. Who’s gonna take it?” Wallace grinned at her. “Old Mrs. Paterson in 104? You don’t exactly live in the ghetto, Mars.”

Logan chuckled and Veronica sighed with relief.

***

As soon as she could get away without arising suspicion, she holed herself up in the bathroom, sat on the edge of the bathtub and dialed a familiar number.

“Veronica?” Rumbled the voice. “Is that you?”

“This must be my lucky day.” She whispered. “A gun, bullets AND a disposable, untraceable cell, all in the one package. You know, it’s nice to finally see proof you listen to me once in a while.”

Weevil chuckled through the line, but it sounded wary.

“Yeah, well, I learned from the best. Thought you might need a way to contact me.” He sighed. “Look, V, things just aren’t adding up.”

“What?” She couldn’t help the sudden fear. “What things?”

Weevil was a tough biker and he probably had a much grittier name for the process, but he was hemming and hawing across the line, she could hear it, and it made her want to reach through just to slap it out of him.

“You got me worried the other day, a gun’s not like you. So I been asking around. A few words here and there, you know?”

Her heart began to sink in her chest. Questions, even discreet ones, were sure to bring attention.

“I went down to the hut and Becky said you haven’t been there in weeks, that you’re taking an ‘unspecified leave of absence’ arranged by your dad.” A small huff of disbelief sounded. “So I called the office, you know, and the Sheriff told me you were busy, what with all your shifts at the Hut and working on cases and getting ready for college, that you couldn’t talk but he’d pass the message on.”

Veronica grimaced.

“Sorry, he’s just…”

“Stonewalling me? Yeah, I got that. I asked around and word on the street is…”

“Wait.” She couldn’t help the little preen, interrupting him with a slight smile. “I’m a word on the street? I’m street word worthy?”

“Veronica, this is bad.” He sighed and it would have sounded impatient if it didn’t sound so worried. “You know Josē? His girlfriend Marissa works in a doctor’s office and she said they brought you in ranting and raving after some attack, that they had to drug you up.”

“Oh my god.” She bit her lip and didn’t tell him it was almost true. “The Chinese whispers must be going crazy. What is it now? Am I dying of rabid asphyxia?”

“Word is you finally went nuts after that night at the Grand with Cassidy and that your dad had to have you committed to the loony bin. Gotta be honest with you, V, nothin’ I’ve found since says otherwise. People are believing this shit.”

It wasn’t exactly a large stretch from the truth, her dad had been watching her with worried eyes lately and she was fairly sure more of it had to do with her sanity than her physical safety.

“What do you mean? What have you found?”

“You call me up asking for a gun, girl, what do expect me to do? I been watching your place. Nobody but a steady stream of the Sheriff, Echolls, and that Wallace kid. Sometimes Mac. In and out, back and forth.”

She leaned forward until her forehead hit the counter, just a tap, just enough so that her head and not her chest carried the weight of her upper body. Her eyes closed and she let her brain complete its somersaults, it left her dizzy.

“And me.” It was a soft voice. “I’m in here.”

“Yeah.” His voice sounded just as soft. “I figured that, too, seeing as how that’s where you wanted delivery. What’s going on? Why are you in lockdown?”

The question was inevitable, the only surprise about it being that he had waited that long to ask.

“It’s complicated, I…”

She paused, mentally picturing his face when the whole story came out. That wasn’t what she wanted. She didn’t think she could take one more person joining the bandwagon of those already set to lock her away for good.

They trusted each other and they watched each other’s backs. That was how they worked, favor for favor, equal and beneficial for both sides, there was no variation. If she relented and showed weakness, that would always be there between them and it would be near on impossible to get back to where they were.

She couldn’t lie to him either.

”I’m in trouble, Weevil.” Her voice shook. “I’m in a lot of trouble and I don’t know how to get out of it.”

A moment stretched out between them, she couldn’t hear anything and she was trying, she desperately needed to know how he was reacting. It was too awkward and she’d made herself too vulnerable. One thing he hated, she knew, was weakness. He couldn’t stand it, not in himself and not in those around him.

A soft gush of air sounded.

“You know how to use that thing?”

That certainly hadn’t been what she was expecting.

“Hello, my name’s Veronica, have you met my dad?” But she didn’t let the joke hang in the air too long. “I’ve had some experience. Not a lot, but I know which end is dangerous.”

His chuckle sounded hollow, but it was still a chuckle and it made warm air gust into her lungs.

“That’s what all the girls say. I’ll teach you.”

“But…”

“Get me in.” It wasn’t really a question. “Get me past the fortress and I’ll make sure you know how to use it.”

***

Cooking for two people, especially when they had established patterns, tastes and similarities was one thing. Doing the same for four people, with differing tastes, appetites and expectations was another thing entirely.

Veronica stirred the pot idly.

“Any chance that whatever’s inside that thing doesn’t end in N’cheese?”

She shrugged and looked up at Keith sorting through his mail as he sat across the bench from her.

“Logan’s not a big fan of the ‘-aroni’ selection. Your choice is limited, mister.”

He smiled indulgently and walked around the counter to press a soft kiss to her forehead.

“You want me to throw a salad together? Maybe turn up the nutrition value of the meal to… oh, something at all?”

“Since when do you care…?” A smile broke out on Veronica’s face. “Oh, I get it. You’re worried about Alicia reading you the riot act, aren’t you?”

The duck of his head was a clear avoidance, as was the blush that spread over his neck and up to his ears.

“Well, we did sorta kidnap her son. The least we can do is feed him.” He cocked his head as if coming to attention as his eyes traveled the room. “Speaking of which, where are the fearsome protectors? They just disappeared.”

“Sleeping.” It was a simple answer. “Now that you’re home, they can finally get some actual sleep in an actual bed without listening to a snoring dog or a completely traumatized girl falling into hysterics.”

She could see the spark in his eye, the sharp little sting of concern and if she didn’t nip that bud then he would start steering them towards rockier, more dangerous territory. Her shoulders were already tight and aching with tension, her eyes heavy with exhaustion and she was really too tired to think.

They didn’t need Condescend Veronica Until She Explodes II, the much awaited Sequel, just now.

“Wallace is in your room and Logan’s in mine.” Her voice stayed calm and casual and she watched him out of the corner of her eyes as she took the plates out of the cupboard. “They were pretty worn out, actually. This whole surveillance thing is taking its toll on them. Maybe we should think about getting someone else in, you know, just to ease the pressure off a bit.”

“Oh, really?” A chuckle came from deep inside the fridge crisper as Keith dug around for the salad ingredients. “And I suppose you’ve already got someone in mind?”

“Here, taste this.” She brought a forkful of the steaming mixture up to his mouth and as soon as he was breathing around the heat of it, she smiled sweetly. “How ‘bout Weevil?”

Keith glared as he coughed, trying to swallow.

“He knows his way around the area.” She hurried to get the words out while she still had time. “He has great contacts and he’s certainly capable of looking fierce, he’s really sweet to me and I know he’ll never let anything happen, he’s just like a big, growly pit bull. Only human.”

“Veronica.” He gasped, sucking cooler air into his mouth. “I know we’ve talked about this back and forth relationship you have with Eli Navarro. He’s a criminal, a convicted criminal, and he just got out of jail.”

She rolled her eyes.

“Please, he was there for a month, it’s not like he spent a decade making license plates, turning earbuds into shivs and running gangs inside the Big House. And he was only there because Lamb couldn’t be bothered doing his job properly and we both know it.”

He nodded; it wasn’t exactly an agreement, more of a realization.

“You’ve already talked to him, haven’t you?”

A guilty smile, complete with a raise of her eyebrows was the only possible answer she could give. She could see the intake of breath he took, the impending lecture she knew was about to happen.

And that was when the phone rang. She cradled the receiver between her ear and shoulder as she juggled the pot over to the plates.

“Hello?”

“Veronica? Hey, it’s Mac.” And Veronica smiled, because Mac always began a phone conversation with that introduction, as if she wouldn’t recognize her after being her friend for so long, as if Mac didn’t have a highly distinctive voice. “I think I’ve got some good news.”

There was the sound of rumbling in the background.

“Hey, are you driving?”

“Yeah.” Came the answer. “I’m headed your way now. Look, I was going over that list of names and details you gave me and matching them with the profiles of all the movie characters Aaron ever played and one’s a total match.”

She felt her heart jump up in her throat.

“Really?” The wooden spoon dropped into the pot. “Who? Which one?”

“Look…” The voice at the other end of the line sounded wary. “Don’t get your hopes up, okay? It could be nothing. I don’t even know if this pans out. I’ve got it here… Hey!”

Veronica heard a sudden squeal of tires and Mac yelling.

“Watch where you’re going, freak!” There was a slight scuffle and then Mac was back. “Sorry, Veronica, just some idiot going about three hundred miles too fast on the…”

Small tiny hairs on the back of Veronica’s neck stood straight up.

“What?” She couldn’t help the shake of her voice. “On the what, Mac?”

“This is weird.” And for some reason, Mac’s voice was smaller, steadier, and calmer than it had been moments before. “He’s turning around.”

“Drive.” It was instantaneous, the snap of decision. “Mac, just drive, do you hear me? Go to the police station and don’t stop until you get there.”

She would have had to be deaf not to hear the sudden blaring of a horn through the phone, loud, long blasts of sound. Or the shiver of fear that escaped in the heavy breath coming through the phone.

“Veronica?” And Mac gasped even louder. “I don’t like this.”

“Get out of there.” Veronica gestured frantically to Keith. “Get away from that car and do not stop. Okay? Don’t pull over.”

“He’s not letting up.”

The loud, screeching sound of metal on metal echoed in her ear and Veronica tried not to cry out loud as things went silent.

“Mac? Mac!” It was frantic. “Mac, are you okay? What happened?”

Her fingers clutched at the phone and she wanted to squeeze it, shake it until she got an answer.

“Oh shit, Veronica.” It was a barely whispered tremble. “This isn’t good.”

And then the phone went dead.

***  



	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Note to self, she thought, making jokes about previous near death experiences at the hands of murdering psychotics while one of them has returned to finish the job is not in good taste.

*~*~*~*

Veronica chewed at the corner of her thumbnail, teeth edging and feeling out the little corner that was beginning to hook under.

“Girl.” Wallace dropped his head into his hands and leaned on the bench. “You need to sit your ass down.”

That was hardly an option as she paced back and forth between the door and the hallway leading to the bedrooms. Even Backup had stopped following her, preferring instead to collapse on the floor, his eyes following her, left to right, as if he was watching tennis.

“I can’t just…” She stopped and looked up. “We need to go. We need to…”

Hands landed on her shoulder and she felt herself being turned around to face Logan.

“Veronica, we need to wait here.”

She tried to wrench free of him.

“But, Mac…!”

“Your dad’s right.” Logan insisted without blinking. “We need to stay put and wait for him or the cops to contact us. Okay?”

Her spine seemed to melt with his words, losing the anxious rigidity that had kept her moving since Keith had walked out the door, strapping his holster on and telling her to call Weevil as he went. Any other time and she’d be miffed, she’d been waiting long and hard for Logan and her father to agree on something, anything, and now they were she had no chance of actually relishing in the moment.

“But…”

It was only a halfhearted protest, enough to get him to pull her in and close his arms around her shoulders.

“Veronica.” He sighed it to the top of her head. “If there is someone out to get you, you’ll only be playing into their hands by putting yourself right where they want you.”

It was only a halfhearted platitude, enough to get her to pull out of his hold and glare at him.

“If? If, Logan?” She could feel the tension begin to boil over in the tears that pricked at her eyes. “Jesus Christ, what is it going to take? He’s going after my friends now!”

Wallace stood up with his hands up, palm outwards, trying to restore peace.

“Hey, come on, he didn’t mean it like that.” His dark eyes sent a warning glare to Logan. “Man, tell her you didn’t mean it like that.”

She wasn’t too far-gone to see the silent battle between the two.

“Yeah, yeah he’s right.” It was capitulation, plain and simple, Veronica knew it. Logan didn’t mean one iota of what he was saying. “Of course it wasn’t supposed to come out like that. I’m worried about you, we’re all worried about you.”

The sarcasm practically dripped from her overly dramatic swoon.

“Wow, Logan, you almost sound like you care. Good job.” A bitter almost laugh escaped her lips. “High marks, really.”

His eyes flashed, bright and just a little bit angry.

“Don’t do this.”

“People are getting hurt!” Her voice skittered into the high ranges as she pointed to her chest. “I’m getting hurt. And Mac… who knows what… What the hell is going to convince you?”

“You think this is easy for me?” He didn’t give her a chance to answer. “The best scenario out of all possible scenarios is that my girlfriend is losing her mind, how is that a good thing, Veronica? What? I’m supposed to be glad that you’re not crazy, that some murderous psycho who knows all your secrets is attacking you? Is that supposed to make me feel better?”

“Woah.” Wallace came to stand between them. “Calm down a little, huh?”

“So excuse me if I’m not jumping straight on the bandwagon to believe my father, whose body I saw with my own eyes, has come back from the dead to kill yet another love of my life!” He was breathing heavily now, one messy lungful of air after another. “He’s gone, he’s dead, I’m finally free of him. So, it can’t be him, okay? It just can’t. He can’t come back to do this again! Not you, Veronica, okay? Just not you. Not again.”

As they stood there, Logan and Veronica glaring at each other and Wallace in the middle with his hands out as if to prevent them both from jumping at each other, a knock sounded on the door.

“Great.” Wallace mumbled it under his breath.

Logan answered the door slowly and Veronica swallowed both her frustration and fear as Wallace positioned himself in front of her. They knew who it was, most likely, especially given that she’d called Weevil less than ten minutes earlier, but all of their nerves were shattered.

She watched Logan’s lip snarl up slightly and his eyes travel Weevil up and down before pushing the door open. For his part, Weevil gave the distrustful glare right back to Logan, eyeing him head to toe as he squeezed past silently.

They were seconds away from snapping and snarling like dogs over a bone.

“Weevs.”

“Echolls.” The chill in the air warmed slightly when Weevil looked away and flashed a smile. “Wallace, man.”

“Hey man.” Wallace answered, the awkwardness in his voice lessened only by the relief that whatever tensions had been rising between her and Logan now had another source of diffusion. “Been a while.”

And she saw it, that fraction of a second as he first looked at her. Weevil’s eyes narrowed and his mouth pursed, it was barely even there, that little rake of his eyes, but she felt it. He was already treating her like a helpless damsel in distress and gone was the precarious equality she’d been craving.

He hid it well, though.

“Hey, V.” She almost jumped when his hand slapped down lightly on her shoulder. Almost. “You gonna tell me what’s going on, now?”

She swallowed.

“Yeah, I… yeah.” She covered his hand with one of her own, soft and gentle, and very subtly taking it away as she nodded towards the hall. “Come on, we’ll go to my room to talk.”

“Like hell.” Logan stepped forward. “You can talk here.”

Veronica closed her eyes for a second, just to block them all out, before pushing Weevil towards the hall with a soft shove. Then she turned on Logan and glared.

“Look, let me talk to him without all the comments from the peanut gallery, okay? You can all piss circles around me later.”

At least he had the grace to duck his head at her comment. She was too tired to do the normal dance of ignoring the overly male posturing they did. Much too tired to actually worry about the flicker of hurt in his eyes or to lower the bitterness from her voice.

“Relax, Logan, _IF_ there was someone out there targeting me, he’s not going to attack me with Weevil right there. But that’s a pretty big if, according to you, isn’t it? So, I guess you don’t have to worry.”

She didn’t need to look at him as she spun for the hallway to see the scowl on his face. She was being petulant and childish and a tiny sliver of guilt inched though her with every step she took, but she didn’t turn around again.

***

Weevil was standing with his back to her when she walked into the room, his hands behind his back and the fingers of his right hand wrapped around his left wrist. His left fingers twitched and clicked in the empty air. On anyone else it would have looked like an innocent gesture. It made Weevil seem like he was holding himself back, caging himself in.

“See anyone you know?”

Five steps to the right and that would have been dangerous territory and an awkward question; the board sprinkled liberally with photos of herself posed with Wallace, her dad, Duncan, Logan and, everywhere, Lilly. The space he was examining was safer, all hotel doors and license plates in the dark, faces hidden in half shadow and caught unawares.

“Yeah.” He gave her a cheeky grin as he turned around. “I think that’s my parole officer.”

Good. She’d been a little worried about where they were going to have to draw that line, but his words made it an open subject, closed over and unraw. She laughed, not because what he’d said was anywhere near funny, but because she wanted to, because there was nothing else to do. And his face was clear and open and friendly and inviting her to laugh. She’d been running on adrenaline and exhaustion and everyone else’s fear.

It was a breath of amusement followed by bursts of increasingly hysterical sounds.

“Hey, c’mon V.” His grin slowly faded, his face fell as his eyebrows knitted together and his jaw tightened, he reached out to her. “What the hell’s going on around here?”

Her hands gripped at her elbows, holding herself tight, even as he pulled her in and covered her own arms with his.

“Oh, you know, the usual.” The laughter died off as quickly as it had started. “Someone’s trying to kill me and now he’s gone after my friends.”

He didn’t believe the casual in her voice and she didn’t blame him as she pulled away.

“Do you know who?”

“Aaron Echolls.” She should really start carrying her camera around more often if it meant she’d be able to capture moments that included Weevil’s face when she said that. “It’s okay, you don’t have to believe me. I don’t think anyone believes that it’s him.”

He rolled his eyes.

“For people who don’t believe you, you sure got a lot of them tryin’ to protect your person. They have to think it’s someone, right?”

“Maybe.” She shrugged. “I think a lot of it was trying to protect me from me to start with, but it keeps getting worse. And now Mac…”

There was a slight look of impatience she was beginning to recognize in his face, the tiniest little bit of tightness that suggested she was rambling and skirting around too many of the main points. The story came out of her mouth sounding strangely bland and familiar.

The car trip home that night, the afternoon in her bedroom, the doctor’s office, the smaller shadows and hints between, and then Mac only minutes before. It was just like when she’d told the tale to Dr. Frey, with some added chapters, reciting the details as they’d happened without really listening to them.

“Huh.” Weevil blinked twice after she’d finished. “So, exactly how is Echolls Sr pulling all this shit?”

That was her turn to blink. The way he’d said it, a little bit dazed, but definitely casual, as if it was nowhere near out of the ordinary to suggest that a dead man had come back to life to haunt her. His reaction, that hers was normal, was so irregular and unexpected that her throat threatened to close up.

“You… you believe me? You think it’s him?”

“You do.” He blinked. “That’s enough for me right there. ‘Sides, in case you haven’t noticed, any time this kinda shit goes down, you’re the one who ends up solving it.”

She was fairly sure her face had taken on some dopey, dreamy eyed expression of awe. It was embarrassing.

“I’m usually the one who ends up locked in a fridge or shot at, actually.”

It was a joke, an offhand comment, but his eyebrows flickered, puckering for just a second in the space between. Note to self, she thought, making jokes about previous near death experiences at the hands of murdering psychotics while one of them has returned to finish the job is not in good taste.

The moment stretched out, tenser than it should have been, until Weevil shook his head.

“Okay, so… what’ve you got?”

It was a release, a call to action and she sighed with relief as she turned towards her desk and pulled out the file that sat underneath a large, thick book about unicorns.

“Mac got me a copy of the autopsy report.” She spread the photos out over the desktop, not even blinking at the picture they portrayed. “It seems fairly conclusive.”

Maybe she didn’t blink, but Weevil obviously did, recoiling from the grisly images before taking a deep breath and then leaning over them, listening to her words.

“Male, estimated to be in his mid to late forties, shot execution style in the back of his head, twice. Identified conclusively by one Logan Echolls to be that of his father, Aaron Echolls.” She bit her lip. “Evidence to support this conclusion include recent scarring on the lower left abdomen that matches injuries sustained during an attack by a crazed stalker, rings worn on both hands that match those owned by Aaron Echolls, as well as visual similarities and general likeness.”

She ignored the look he was giving her.

“Pretty damn conclusive, V.”

The next photo she inched out of the rest, placed it in clear view, all ten square inches of glossy horror.

“The first bullet entered the back of his skull and stayed there, the second one tore through his cranium and then exited the body through the facial cavity.”

Weevil swallowed.

“Cavity?”

“Yeah.” Her finger traced the glossy print. “Cavity. His face was blown off. Nothing but gristle and blood and bone fragments where his million dollar smile should be. And the jaw was too torn up for a positive dental ID.”

“Jesus.” It was a low whistle. “This is fucked up. What about fingerprints?”

She blinked in surprise. Not everybody would be that calm and analytical in the face of what she’d just laid out, Wallace had made faces and told her never to show him autopsy photos over lasagna ever again, she hadn’t had the heart to show Logan, and her father was out of the question until she knew what the information actually proved.

“That’s the funny thing. They took the prints, but were unable to match them to any existing in the database.”

“So, it’s not Echolls then, right? I mean, the man was in jail for murder, his prints must be etched into a million files.”

“You’d think so.” She shrugged. “But it seems there was a glitch in the computer system and all files of Aaron Echolls, prints included, have been eroded and attacked by some bug. Any hard copies on file have also disappeared.”

Weevil huffed, an escape of trapped air.

“And that’s not raising suspicions with anyone else?”

She blushed as she looked down at the desk and not up at him.

“It’s possible not everyone has that information. I might not have gotten it through entirely kosher channels.”

“But your dad?”

“Would not be happy to know I’ve been digging this far and, until I have conclusive evidence, he’s not going to know. Capiché?”

He nodded, overly serious with just a hint of humor in his eyes.

“Absolutely.”

She sucked her bottom lip in under her teeth, trying to stop herself just blurting out exactly how much it meant that he was there and listening to her, without making her feel like he was merely humoring the inpatient until the meds kicked in.

There was a knock on the door.

“Hey.” Wallace burst in. “Your dad’s on the phone.”

***

“Yeah. Yeah, okay.” Logan looked up at them when they walked into the living room, holding up a hand to stop her grabbing the phone right out of his grip. “That’s great, really.”

Veronica breathed deeply. She could tell, both by his words and by the relieved look in his eyes, that Mac was okay. Whatever had happened and wherever they were now, Mac was fine. She had to be, or Logan wouldn’t be looking like that.

“I will yes, okay.” He continued to fend her off as he spoke irritatingly vague sentences. “Both of us? Okay, sure, that should be cool.”

She waited, counting to five until he eventually set down the receiver, and then she jumped forward.

“What? What did he say? Is Mac all right? What?”

“Mac’s fine.” He answered, brushing the hair back from her eyes and pulling her in to kiss the top of her head. “A little shaken up, but fine. Your dad’s taking her to the hospital and he wants…”

Her breath caught on that one word and she pulled back a little, just enough to look him in the face.

“The hospital? What happened? Oh my god…”

“Relax.” Logan shushed her. “He said she was fine, just a formality. And he wants Wallace and me to go wait by the car until the tow truck gets there.”

There was a moment of awkwardness, where Logan glared over her shoulder and she got the distinct impression that Weevil was giving as good as he got. God, she did not need this. Not now. Peacekeeping took strength and she didn’t have the extra energy to handle Logan with kid gloves, so she turned slowly in his arms and let his hands stay around her shoulders, winding around her neck so that his wrists crossed each other in front of her neck.

She could feel him behind her head, eyes looking forward, and didn’t even try to convince herself it was a comforting gesture.

“Is that okay?” She hurried to break the tension. “Do you mind staying?”

“Hell, no.” Weevil lifted his chin a little, winked, and spread his hands out wide. “I’m all yours, V, you know that.”

Fuel to the fire. They never changed.

Logan’s chest expanded against the back of her ribs and she knew he was about to let loose with something, just breathing in and preparing for impact. They could stand in the apartment and argue until they were all blue in the face, which, when talking about Logan and Weevil, tended to be more literal than figurative, but the truth was they all had things they needed to do.

And as much as Logan was posturing, she knew he would leave and go guard the car with Wallace, because both of them had been obeying Keith’s instructions to the letter since they’d watched the tape. Keith was the clear and uncontested general of this little army.

“Did he say what she saw?” She turned back around to face Logan before he could say whatever he’d been about to. “I mean, what happened? What got her so upset?”

“Nothing like that.” Logan replied with a shrug as he looked down at her. “Just what you heard. He’s taking her to get checked out and will call back when they’re done, we have to go babysit the car, you’re to stay here with Weevil and… there was another… oh yeah, something about not doing anything stupid like calling the hospital and pretending to be Mrs. Mackenzie to check up on Mac.”

“Oh, please.” She rolled her eyes. “Like I’d do that anyway.”

But it was pretense and Veronica was really off her game if she hadn’t even thought about doing that before he’d said it. By the looks of it, the matching sniggers given by Weevil and Wallace at her words, she knew that they’d been thinking the same thing.

Logan didn’t bother replying to it, either.

“Come on, Wallace.” He grabbed his keys from his pocket and swirled them around his finger. “Let’s go save the poor defenseless car.”

“To the canary-mobile!” Wallace snapped to attention before jumping sideways and heading for the door. “Away!”

“Hey.” Logan frowned. “You wanna walk? Don’t diss my car, man.”

But Wallace had already reached the door.

“You’re just upset that I called the manly chest plate and you got left with the cape and tights.”

Logan sighed dramatically as he waved at Veronica with a little twist of his wrist and flutter of his fingers and she responded in kind by pursing her lips and blowing him a kiss before he followed Wallace out.

“But you have to admit, the green really brings out my eyes!”

When the door had closed behind them, Veronica checked that it was locked and then turned to glare at Weevil.

“You just can’t control yourself, can you? You have to bait him along?”

He ducked his head a little as he grinned.

“Not my fault Echolls is twitchy. What, he doesn’t trust you?”

And just like that, they’d screeched right back into dangerous territory. She broke the gaze first, breathing carefully and deliberately as she stepped into the kitchen and began the nightly ritual of scrubbing out Backup’s dish before feeding him.

“It’s not me he doesn’t trust.”

She wasn’t sure whether or not he’d heard, but she doubted he missed the implication.

***

“So?” Weevil poked the congealed mess on his plate with a fork. “How long do you think they’re gonna be?”

Veronica shrugged. She’d long given up hope of salvaging the dinner she’d spent so long opening packets to create. Instead, she used her fork to push it around into little shapes that resembled nothing found in nature. At least, she hoped it would never be found in nature.

“Who knows? Even if they’re just getting a band aid, the hospital could take five minutes or five hours and, well, tow trucks at this time of night aren’t exactly efficient.”

He reached over the small table and grabbed her wrist, turning it over to look at the fading scars.

“You really think that psycho is back?”

A small nod.

“Yeah.”

“And you think he’s trying to kill you?”

She couldn’t quite get all the words Aaron had said to her, threats and promises alike, out of her head. There was no doubt in her mind.

“Yes.”

He looked up at her without raising his head, dark eyes angled high as his thumb scratched over the shiny pink ridges of new skin that were the last remnants of her burns.

“Then let’s get this show on the road. Where’s the gun?”

She pulled her hand back and slid slowly off the chair, reaching out to take the plates and rinse them in the sink.

“It’s… uh…” The water that came out of the tap was hot, the pipes still heated from her intense scrubbing of Backup’s dishes. “It’s in my room.”

“Then let’s go.” He stood up, hefting his right shoulder towards her room. “You said you’d had some experience, right? Show me what you know.”

She tried to smile.

“Uh, okay.” Her hands shook a little, but she covered them with the dishtowel she dried them with. “Sure.”

It was weird, more than a little strange, and she was beginning to doubt her own sanity in actually owning a gun, let alone using it. Her dad would be furious if he knew. They had talked about getting her a firearms license after Aaron’s first attack, but they’d both agreed not to invite trouble if they didn’t need it.

Of course, that was then.

“It’s in here.” She gestured towards her drawers, particularly the second one down. “They haven’t seen it, yet.”

Small smiles teased the edges of his lips as he watched her pull the handle and lift several folded shirts before delicately drawing out the gun, still in the plastic baggie that she’d found it in.

“I bet it’s not even loaded, is it?”

“Of course not.” Her eyebrows wrinkled. “The clips are two drawers down. I’m not that irresponsible.”

“Maybe you should be.” He sighed. “Look, if you had kids running around here, I’d be right behind you on that sentiment, but you don’t. What you have is a need to pull that thing at a moment’s notice and shoot it if you have to. Okay, show me what you got.”

She blinked as he raised his brows in the universal sign of telling someone to hurry things along. The gun nestled in the upturned palms of her hand as she lifted it towards him.

“It’s a gun, Weevil, a Lorcin .380, if I’m not mistaken. Incredibly unreliable after just a few hundred rounds, but highly favored by street criminals, because they get the job done, they’re easily disposable and cheap and so is the ammo. It’s one of the most traced guns by the ATF for that very reason. And the fact that this one cost me one-fifty means that you managed to find one that technically doesn’t exist on any paper in the country.”

Her smile was only slightly smug.

“Wow.” His eyes almost popped out of his head, but they were also glinting with amusement. “You have the internet. I’m impressed.”

The next smile was more sincere as she hefted the gun again, bouncing it lightly in her palm.

“I like it, it’s all black and shiny.”

“Take it out of the plastic.” He crosses his arms over his chest and leaned back, the very picture of casual. “And point it at me.”

She took a step back.

“What?” Her hair flicked the sides of her neck as she shook her head. “No.”

“C’mon.” He was obviously challenging her and he obviously enjoyed it. “There aren’t any clips in it, you said so yourself. If you can’t point an empty gun at me, how’re you going to point a loaded one at someone else?”

Well, he had a point and she ceded, slipping her fingernails under the seal of the bag. Her hands were shaking again as she closed her fingers around the ridged black casing and slipped them into the curve of the trigger.

She let the bag fall to the floor and brought the small pistol up as she’d been taught, feet planted firmly on the ground, shoulder width apart, arms locked and steady, her left hand firmly cradling the weight of her right wrist as she pointed the gun directly at Weevil.

Silence reigned for several seconds.

“Shit, Veronica!” He finally burst into gleeful laughter, cheeks turning bright red. “You really are a cop’s daughter, aren’t you?”

Her arms softened slightly, elbows unlocking.

“What?”

He reached out and tapped the underside of her arms, knocking the tension out of her stance.

In her lifetime, she could count on the fingers of one hand exactly how many times she’d held a gun and the times she’d shot one even less. Her dad had taken her to the pistol ranges before, a few times, and taught her the proper way to guard her wrists against the kickback, the regulation stance, all the official, proper ways to conduct herself with a firearm. Once before and then twice after the first showdown with Aaron, when they’d first talked about her getting a license. It was cold and clinical and she’d loaded the small pistol with blanks and then, when it had finally gotten to that point at the third visit, pretended to be sick so that he never noticed she hadn’t actually pulled the trigger.

Or maybe he had, because he hadn’t taken her back.

“When this guy Aaron comes at you, is he a black boarded target at the end of a polite pistol range?”

She blushed.

“No?”

Weevil stepped forward, once and then twice, until the point of the gun was against his sternum, held right up to his chest. She could see the front of his shirt pucker with the pressure and could only imagine the skin underneath doing the same thing. She held her breath and tried hard not to shake with it.

When her dad had been rolling on the ground, wheezing through lungfuls of smoke and skin layers of agony, she hadn’t thought about it. She’d seen the gun, picked it up, and held it as steady as she could with trembling hands. Aaron had already been hit by the van, incapacitated, and he hadn’t put up a struggle.

“He comes at you again, what the hell you gonna do? Ask him to stand still and wait nicely at fifty paces while you lock, load and ‘assume the position’?”

The gun trembled a little and his hands came up to cover hers as he stepped forward again, his eyes never leaving hers. She couldn’t let go and she stepped back, he didn’t give her any room and she found herself forced to bend her elbows, closing the distance until the gun was pressed up between them.

“”What do you think he’s gonna say, Veronica? ‘Sure, want me to hold the spare clips while you fill the chamber?’ Stop watchin’ CSI and learn how to hold the damn thing without looking like you want to drop it.”

The next time she’d held a loaded gun, she’d fired it. Cassidy had pointed it at her, tried to kill her father and then shot at Logan. Sometimes the memory of that night was blurry and she couldn’t always remember the exact sequence of events that led to the gun being in her hands.

She usually got vague images of her own screams, Logan’s cries, Cassidy’s tears, the screech of electricity through her blood, and all of it coming together with a single squeeze of her forefinger, the burst of heat through her hands that had seemed to suck every sound out of the atmosphere. But she hadn’t aimed that one, just held it skyward and let loose. By the time she’d actually pointed the gun at Cassidy, both he and Logan were standing still and then Logan had taken it from her hands.

She’d never pulled out a gun and shot at someone, certainly never at a person who was coming at her at full strength, without even the concept of stopping.

“I… I don’t…” She tried to pull the barrel down, to stop it aiming, but he wouldn’t give up the pressure. “I can’t…”

“Well, you’re gonna have to learn.” He stepped back and she felt herself breathe a whole lot easier. “How much give you got in those jeans?”

And then she was nervous all over again.

“What?”

He gave her a cocky grin and a chuckle, even as his eyes slid down the front of her body.

“Relax, V, I just wanna know if they’ve got enough give to fit a gun down the front, but still hold it secure against your stomach without accidents.”

“Um, okay.” Her head cocked to the left a little. “Why the front? Don’t all gangstas and homeboys keep it in the back? Or has TV lied to me again? Say it isn’t so.”

“Yeah, generally, it’s easier to hide it, people don’t usually walk around lifting up the back of your shirt, but a gun poking out the top of the front of your pants? They’d see if they were looking.”

“Oh.” A small pout. “Then why am I keeping it up front?”

“Because you don’t need to hide it, you want it seen and you want it in easy reach.” He motioned with his own hand, comparing reaching for a gun in the waist of his back and a gun in the waist of his stomach. “He’s been at you three times and each time, a gun at your back woulda done shit, right?”

Veronica thought about the feel of being trapped against the car seat, underneath him on the bed, and then against the wall of the elevator. He was right. He’d obviously had more experience and had thought much more about how and when she was going to need to use it than she actually had.

There was only one thing to do.

“Okay.” She nodded. “Teach me.”

For a good forty minutes he demonstrated exactly how to pull the gun and hold it without tensing, keeping her wrist flexible while her arm and hand provided cover for her neck and chest, how to aim before even pulling the gun, how to aim at a target less than a foot away, and how to aim it over her shoulder or around the back of her waist.

She wouldn’t ever say she liked the gun or that it felt comfortable in her hands, because she didn’t and it probably never would, but it became increasingly easier to imagine using it to stop Aaron if she needed to. It felt liberating and she liked it.

Weevil laughed when she placed the gun back in the drawer when they were finished, but he didn’t press her and she was grateful for that. For everything, for him being there and listening to her and making her feel partly able to defend herself.

“They lied, you know.”

It took her by surprise, because she hadn’t known she was going to say it out loud.

“What?” He seemed startled by the revelation. “Who?”

“Logan.” She said it softly and calmly. “About the phone call.”

Weevil’s eyes softened as he watched her.

“How do you know?”

There were so many things she could say. The speed of Logan’s eye movements, his dramatic gestures meant to distract her, the small flush of blood up the back of his neck that stopped just before it reached his hairline, the way he’d been too eager to leave before she questioned him. It was all there.

“I just do.” She counted to five. “I guess there’s only one way to find out.”

“Hey.” Weevil stepped forward just as she began to walk out of the room to the living room. “Your dad said not to call the hospital.”

Veronica smiled sweetly as she dialed a number into the phone.

“That’s okay, then, because I’m not calling them.”

She listened to the dial tone, the clicking of the number and the connection ringing several times before being answered. The voice on the other end of the line was breathy and confused.

“Veronica?” Logan panted. “Are you okay? What happened?”

“I… I don’t know, Logan.” She knew without looking that Weevil was stunned with the sudden change she’d gone from calm and peaceful to a teary, sobbing wreck. “Weevil’s not here, he went to take Backup for a walk and that was twenty minutes ago. He’s not answering his phone. I don’t know… I can’t…”

“Shit!” She could hear him scrambling on the other end. “Hang on, wait there, I’ll… I don’t know…”

She sniffed.

“You know what? I’m gonna call my dad. I need to talk to him. He’ll know what to do. I just need to talk to him… I just… He’ll know.”

And then she hung up, taking a deep breath to clear herself. She felt the oxygen enter her lungs and spread to the far reaches of her body. Then she turned and winked at Weevil, who still hadn’t said a word.

“Wait for it.” The clock on the DVD player ticked over slowly, but she managed to give it a good six minutes. “Okay, showtime.”

The next number was just as familiar as the first and the person on the other end of the line picked up a lot faster than Logan had.

“Hey dad!” She chirped pleasantly. “How’s Mac?”

“Veronica?” He sounded confused. “Are you alright? What’s happening?”

She huffed a little, a small embarrassed laugh.

“Backup was getting antsy, so Weevil took him outside and he got off his leash, so it took too long for them to come back and I kinda panicked. But they’re back now. And I feel like an idiot. Weevil laughed at me.”

“Are you sure you’re alright?”

“Yes.” She insisted. “I’m fine, really. How’s Mac?”

“Uh.” There was a pause. “Mac’s fine. Just a few bumps and bruises from driving her car off the road. It’s a bit of a write off, but you get that. She’ll be released after they finish putting on all the band-aids. Don’t worry. I can get her to call you when she’s through.”

“Yeah.” She made sure to smile all the way to her eyes, so that her voice sounded sincere. “That’d be great, thanks dad.”

The receiver clicked hard when she dropped it down to the cradle.

“Yeah, they lied.”

Weevil shook his head as if to clear it.

“What? Huh? What I miss?”

“Not about Mac, I’m sure they wouldn’t keep something that bad from me, but Dad’s at the hospital, I heard all the background noise. Announcements, beeps, people, that hospital sound is unmistakable, trust me, I got to know it well last year.”

He frowned.

“Yeah, we knew that, so?”

She lifted her eyebrow.

“So, hospitals don’t allow cell phones. And he answered on the second ring. Which means not only did he have it turned on, he was waiting for my call outside the building and expecting me to be hysterical on top of that.”

Realization flooded his features.

“And the only way he’d know that…”

She nodded.

“Was if Logan clued him in. In six minutes. Hardly enough time to drive there, or to call him and randomly expect dad to pick up. Which means Logan’s at the hospital, too. And if Logan is, you can bet Wallace is. Which begs the question, why do they need all three there and why is it such a secret?”

“Shit.”

Veronica winked and grabbed her jacket.

“Not right now, we have things to do.” She didn’t give him time for surprise. “There’s a file in the office, probably locked in my dad’s safe, and I know it has to do with me and this case somehow. We need to find that.”

“Yeah, okay.” He stood up, keys in hand. “But I’m not going anywhere without that gun.”

***

“So, what are we looking for?” Weevil eyed the walls warily. “And doesn’t this place give you the creeps at night?”

Street lamps outside the window filtered through the stained glass and sent rainbows smearing off every surface. Veronica looked at her desk, the familiar items scattered over the top of it, the pictures on the wall, the couch, the door to her father’s office, and breathed in deeply.

“It’s almost like home.” And then breathed out. “Without the crippling twenty four hour guard. Which, you know, I asked for, but that’s really neither here nor there.”

“Yeah.” He gave her a sideways glance. “I’m supposed to be on the ‘Veronica is sane’ side of the fence, right?”

It felt good to chuckle, she hadn’t been doing enough of that lately.

“Just shut up and help me break into dad’s safe.”

“Oh, Eli.” He swooned in a deep voice. “Bringing my daughter a gun? Breaking into my private safe? You sure have changed, son. You’re welcome to all the Mars family barbecues after this.”

As she used her keys to open the door, Veronica gave him a quick smile and then ducked her head down so he wouldn’t see the brief frown of confusion. It was just a joke, she knew that, that was how they worked. But also, more than anyone, she knew how much sarcasm and humor often held the truth.

She hadn’t known he’d secretly wanted her dad’s approval. Or that of the family Mars.

“Are you kidding?” The smaller office was just as dark and flushed out with muted color. “With those sorts of activities, you’re like the son he never had. Trust me, I’ve done worse, you fit right in.”

She walked straight to the desk and began pawing through the calendar, not that she particularly thought she’d find the code there, but it was something to do.

“You try the safe.” Not even Alicia’s birthday had anything written on it. “Start with 31-53-17.”

“Sure.” He knelt in front of the safe and began turning the dial. “You gonna just spout random numbers at me all night? ‘Cause that could take a while.”

Her hand jiggled at the top drawer, it was locked.

“Our flight numbers to New York, he has a history. Any luck?”

“Nope.”

“How ‘bout 02-05-26?” The drawer was easily jimmied open and she continued speaking without waiting for him to ask. “The date of Aaron’s release.”

There was no luck with that, either, or any of the larger dates she could think of, flight numbers, birthdays, anniversaries, Lilly’s death, Cassidy’s death, the night Aaron first attacked her, nothing. She’d graduated from the desk to the pin board.

“I don’t think we’re getting in here, V.”

Her lips pursed.

“He never uses random numbers, trust me.”

Her eyes roamed over countless fliers of wanted men, bail jumpers and alimony evaders and petty criminals alike. Some were current, others had ‘solved’ over their faces and her mouth screwed to the side as she stared at them. There had to be something.

She really needed to clean it, to take down all the solved ones and make everything more efficient, at least clear away the disturbing taint her father seemed to prefer of ‘the ones that got away’. She’d been trying to do that all year; ever since the first big block he’d had of losing cases and clients.

“Got it.” She grinned. “Try 46-25-14.”

The clicks sounded across the room and she watched the door swing open.

“Do I even want to know?”

“The start of my dad’s hospital inpatient number with all the zeroes removed from when he was there last summer.”

She skimmed through all the files that were there, cases and names she knew and wasn’t all that interested in right then. And in the middle, hiding in plain view, mixed in with everything else, she found an unmarked manila folder.

Her dad labeled everything properly for the files.

“What is it?”

Weevil must have noticed she’d gone still as she held it.

“Hopefully, answers.”

And with that, she brought the file to the table and opened it. It was a single page with a list of names, three of which had been crossed off, two had question marks and one had an asterisk. She frowned down at it and Weevil looked over her shoulder.

“Okay, so what does that mean?”

“Nothing yet.” She shrugged as she reached for her laptop. “But they’re written in Logan’s handwriting and crossed out with my dad’s. So now we do the grunt work.”

Logging into the Private Eyez database was as familiar as breathing. It only took minutes to bring up the files on Misters Parker, Grant and Stafford. They certainly weren’t listed for their proximity. Delaware, Atlanta and Chicago.

She clicked a few more keys on the keyboard.

“Huh.” Her skin began to prickle. “Looks like all three of the possibilities had received regular payments, large ones no less, from the firm of one Mr. Harvey Greenblat over the last few years.”

“Who’s he now?”

“Aaron’s agent.”

She reached for the phone and began to dial.

“Who are you callin’ now?”

“The firm of one Mr. Harvey Greenblat.”

Weevil looked at her with raised eyebrows.

“You really think they’re gonna be open this late at night?”

She made a face akin to blowing a raspberry.

“This is Hollywood, baby. Agents to rich, multimillion-dollar clients never sleep. Or, at least, their underpaid secretaries never do.”

“Hello.” Came the overly cheerful voice. “Mr. Greenblat’s office.”

“Good evening.” Veronica used her casual, yet understated professional voice as she spoke. “This is Monica Parker, Lyle Parker’s wife. I was just checking to see…”

“Hang on one moment please.” There was the sound of typing across the line. “I’m sorry Mrs. Parker, there’s been no call for any Aaron Echolls look-alikes since his unfortunate death. We’ll be sure to contact your husband if we need further assistance.”

“Oh, yes, okay. Of course.” She couldn’t breathe. “Thank you.”

Weevil was looking at her with concerned eyes as she hung up.

“Bad news?”

“Shit.” Veronica felt herself clutching the edge of the desk. “Shit. Shit. Shit. They’re Aaron look-alikes. The muscle agents hire to walk down the red carpet when the real star doesn’t want to. They smile, they wave, and they fool everyone.”

“Is anyone that good?”

She shook her head, but it wasn’t a denial.

“If Logan knows their names, then yes.”

Her lungs had grown exceedingly tight and she was trying to concentrate on breathing at the same time she was going over the last few weeks in her head. Aaron’s voice, Aaron’s face, his hands and his threats. It had all seemed so real.

And then it clicked.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” The answer was all too simple in the end. “Weevil, get my dad on the phone, tell him I know what’s happening.”

She pointed to her desk, abandoned and lonely by itself in the middle of the lobby, as she checked over the financial histories again, just to be sure. A quick phone call later, where she played the part of perky and cheerful agent secretary confirmed her suspicions.

“He got paid.” It was a whisper to herself. “He got paid millions by a separate party in the first week of May and then he emptied most of it and went missing.”

And then she read the name of the person who’d paid him.

“Come on.” She stood up, closing her laptop quickly. “We’ve gotta go.”

Weevil didn’t answer.

He didn’t answer because he was currently slumped over her desk, arms awkwardly lying by the side of his head and his face smushed sideways into the keyboard. The telephone receiver lay inches from his right hand, as if he’d dropped it on the way down.

“Weevil!” She ran around her dad’s desk, through the door and to her own. “Oh my god, Weevil!”

He didn’t answer.

“Please, please, please.” Her fingers fumbled on the telephone as she dialed 911. “Please be okay, please.”

There was a pulse steady against the tendons of his neck and that, at least, made her breathe easier as she gave the details to the operator. There were no obvious signs of injury. It looked exactly like he’d just fallen asleep.

That was when she saw the little string of cotton on the back of his shirt, incongruous and barely worth noticing, a small thread poking out from the weave of the material. She shouldn’t and normally wouldn’t have noticed it, except for the fact that it looked like it had been caught on something and pulled out.

Her eyes spanned the back of the chair he was sitting on.

Chills ran up her spine.

She ran to the kitchen and found a plastic bag and a towel, barely pausing as she raced back to the desk. The towel wrapped around her fingers, she gently eased three of the needles poking out of the cushion and placed them in the bag.

Whatever had been in them, the paramedics would be able to work faster if they had a sample.

“Okay, that’s it.”

She heard the sirens approaching and quickly, but very carefully, patted down Weevil’s pockets until she felt the butt of the gun. One pistol and one clip that was all she had. She didn’t have time to search for any extra ammo that Weevil might have picked up.

It was going to have to do.

After she’d made sure the paramedics had found him, explaining the details as much as she could, Veronica slipped into the driver’s seat of Weevil’s car. It was odd and felt strange, as if she was invading someone else’s territory, and the gun at her waist dug into her skin as she revved the accelerator.

“Come and get me, you bastard.”

***  



	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Veronica was fairly certain she'd crossed the bridge from 'overly precautious' to 'utter raving loon'.

*~*~*~*

She had no idea what she was doing. Not one. In fact, she was fairly sure that it was one of those moments that both Logan and her father always berated her for afterwards. Running out alone, taking charge and rushing straight into danger.

Logan called her a psychopath’s wet dream.

Her dad just called her foolish.

The gearshift choked against her shaky hand, making a loud, crunching sound she was never, ever going to tell Weevil she’d created in his car. She could practically feel the engine groan and complain under her less than stellar maneuvering.

“I know.” She whispered to the screech of complaining accelerator. “Just be patient with me, ‘kay? I’m trying.”

The truth was, she hadn’t been behind the wheel of a car for weeks and she certainly hadn’t been behind the wheel of this car ever. Nothing was familiar, none of the buttons or controls were where she was familiar with them being, and the feel of too much air behind her seat made her brain shut down if she thought about it.

So she didn’t.

She looked forward, eyes focused solely and stubbornly on the road ahead. If she didn’t think about it, she wouldn’t have to worry about all the ways in which she was vulnerable sitting inside a car she didn’t know, by herself, in the dark, like a big target.

Anybody lying in wait would be able to close in on her without giving a single clue, they’d be able to follow her or even hone in on her with a rifle-mounted sight. For all she knew, she was playing straight into his hands.

So she didn’t think about it and she certainly didn’t make herself dizzy with holding her breath too long, listening for any sound that might be strange or out of place, and she didn’t hurt her eyes scanning the road and the sidewalks looking for anything that looked remotely suspicious.

It was almost funny, because everything down to the crumpled up milk carton on the side of the road was suspicious. The tree branch swinging precariously from a break in the limb was suspicious. The young couple crossing the road that looked vaguely familiar that might have gone to Neptune high, with their happy, scrubbed pink faces was suspicious. Even the golden retriever sitting on the porch of a house seemed to be giving her a shady look.

Veronica was fairly certain she’d crossed the bridge from ‘overly precautious’ into ‘utter raving loon’.

Her phone, at least, felt familiar and she dialed one handed with ease.

“Veronica?” Her dad picked up after only one ring. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m sorry.”

She’d planned to start strong, something well thought out and logical, something that made her actions at least marginally acceptable. The instantly weak, tear filled apology hadn’t exactly been what she’d had in mind.

“Veronica?” He was edgy already. “Where’s Eli?”

The light ahead of her turned red and she eased her foot onto the brake.

“He’s uh…” Her voice wouldn’t stop shaking. “He’s on his way to the hospital now. Are you sure Mac’s alright?”

There was a brief second of silence before he answered.

“She’s fine, I told you I’ll get her to call you. Speaking of, where are you?”

That was her father, always digging between the lines and asking the hard questions.

“Um… not on my way to the hospital?” One quick breath in and she continued before he had a chance to interrupt. “Look, dad, we went to the office to check up on some things. There were some sort of needles in my chair, Weevil sat down and then he was unconscious. I called the paramedics; they should be there soon. You need to check up on him.”

She didn’t need to see him to picture the frown on his face.

“Veronica, I don’t know where you are, but I want you here now. Do you understand me?”

“We found the list.” If only she could be as sure as she sounded, as confident. “Of names you’ve been eliminating. Did you know Lyle Parker received a multimillion dollar payout days before Aaron was murdered?”

The sigh came heavy over the phone.

“Turn around.” He insisted. “And meet me at the hospital. Do you hear me?”

“Did you know Lyle hasn’t been seen since the murder?”

“Veronica?” His voice held a bit of steel now, the same steel she recognized as coming from fear. “Are you listening to me? Don’t do anything stupid. I’ve been trying to track the money; it cleared from his account before he vanished. I’ve had some leads, but I need you here right now. We can look into them after. Okay?”

The scenery outside the window had all but blurred and she had to remind herself to watch where she was going.

“Track where it went?” She could have laughed. “What about where it came from? Dad, you always taught me…”

“It came from his sister.” He said quietly. “I already looked…”

It was a small, angry little chuckle that came from the back of her throat.

“Well, you didn’t look hard enough. Did you find where she got it from?”

“Veronica? Listen to me…”

“Listen to you? Dad, I’ve been listening to you!” Her fingers slipped a little on the steering wheel, sweat slick and pale. “And now Mac’s in hospital and Weevil’s headed there! Those drugs were meant for me and you know it! This isn’t going to stop unless I stop it.”

“Veronica Mars…”

It was his no nonsense, no arguments, do what you’re told Missy, hut hut hut voice.

“Heads up on Weevil.” She told him again. “And I’m sorry.”

Then she hung up.

***

She had to stop the car four times.

It washed over her each time, breaking like a wave of rolling, grinding panic, each one larger and grander than the last. Sweat trickled down her spine, underneath the creases of her knees, and between her breasts. Her throat closed up inch by inch, starting as a ballooning pressure underneath her sternum and closing around her trachea until she was leaning over the wheel, gasping.

But she didn’t stay parked in the same place for too long.

Her phone buzzed continuously and she kept looking at the letters D-A-D highlighted on the screen. She refused to answer, but she didn’t need to, because she could already hear him telling her to turn around, asking her to think about what she was doing, and generally playing the dad card.

And she knew what would happen if she answered, he wouldn’t stop until she agreed with him, until she actually did spin the wheel around and meet him at the hospital, until she let him and Logan and everyone else stand in between her and her fear, instead of facing it herself.

When, really, it all boiled down to one thing.

Veronica wasn’t going to be the victim anymore.

Dr. Frey had been right. She’d spent so much of the last few years having so many bad things happen, that she didn’t know when to stop looking for the next one. She didn’t know how to fight back. She didn’t know how to demand what she needed, ask for what she wanted or say no to what she didn’t.

And it wasn’t just Aaron and Cassidy and Liam Fitzpatrick with their hands around her throat. It was her mother, reeling her in and spitting her out time and time again. It was Lilly, gone and nowhere near forgotten, controlling everything from beyond the grave and never letting go. It was Duncan, always, always taking with soft hands, always expecting more, and never ever giving as much as he promised in return. It was her dad lying and Wallace leaving and stupid comments from thoughtless people and one more unexplained flat tire and Logan creating wars and non-existent enemies for something to do and people dying and being arrested and leaving and stealing and hurting for the sake of hurting.

And, mostly, it was Veronica, letting them all do it.

Well, she thought, screw that.

“Veronicaaaaaaaa.”

She slammed her foot on the brake the instant her heart exploded inside her chest, fingers fumbling to push the gear into park.

“Veronicaaaaaaaa.”

Her head spun around and she grappled with the back of her seat as she searched the empty car. His voice slid into her ear like a bug, thousands of legs scratching at the delicate curving skin of her lobes.

“Ver…”

“Shit.”

She hissed the word as she looked to the side, at the faintly glowing phone on the passenger seat. It vibrated again, letting out the low growl of his voice calling her name. It shook in her hands when she picked it up. The name on the screen was nothing but a pattern of asterisks, but there was only one person it could have been.

Only one person who could have programmed a name and a specialty ring tone into her phone. It made her wonder exactly how long he’d been watching her sleep before she’d woken up. He could have done anything.

The thought, coupled with the picture of Weevil lying helpless and pliable against the desk, made her retch.

She was shaking so hard she dropped the phone between the seats and the gearshift and had to take several deep, gasping breaths to calm herself before she could dig it out. It stopped ringing, his voice echoing out her name slowly dying off into silence.

When she felt the skin of her wrist scratch against the side of the seat, she pulled it back as if burned.

Her brain slowly counted to fifty and she didn’t feel any weaker or dizzier.

Veronica held her breath and stuck her hand down into the small gap, sliding her fingers around the phone and pulling it up instantly. As far as she could tell, nothing else had scratched her. She wasn’t sure exactly how she managed to find the name in the phone and press send without dropping it again, she was shaking that hard.

“Hello?”

He sounded casual, amused and bored all at the same time.

“What have you done to me?” Her voice was higher and more hysterical than she would have preferred. “What have you done?”

A chuckle scratched its way down her spine.

“Veronica, I’m flattered you think I’m capable of such grand plans.”

She wanted to spit out any number of insults.

“I know you killed that man.” But she kept her voice calm instead. “I don’t know how, but I’m going to find out and I’m going to prove it and this time I’ll make sure you never get out. Do you hear me?”

“And how are you planning to do that?” He hissed into her ear. “With your scary taser and your big, big gun?”

At her gasp, he laughed again.

“Yes, I’ve seen it.” He paused. “I can see it now, I can see you now.”

Blood pounded through her ears as she tried to turn around slowly, her eyes searching through the darkness for anything that might be a person watching from the shadows. She couldn’t see anything and she tried to keep her voice steady and calm.

“Right.” The words stuck deep in her throat, as if her mouth was coated in thick peanut butter. “I’m sure you can.”

The car stalled, her foot slipping on the accelerator when she tried to start it, and the engine flooded.

“Dammit!”

It slipped out before she could stop herself and the answering chuckle reminded her why she should have tried harder.

“Trouble? Veronica?”

“No.” But the engine refused to tick over, no matter how hard she strained it. “None.”

“And to think.” He mused. “They tried to make you out to be a professional liar on the stand. Now that’s funny. I’ll see you soon, Veronica.”

The connection snapped dead and she was left staring at a silent phone.

Her brain kicked into overdrive. She had to get away from the car, if she couldn’t start it and couldn’t drive it away; she needed to get the hell away from it. He knew she had a gun, which meant that he’d seen her sometime that afternoon.

The only time she’d had it out anywhere had been inside her bedroom with Weevil, that thought gave her chills, and when she’d helped the paramedics load Weevil into the ambulance and then gotten into his car. Logically, and through a lot of prayer on her part, it made the most sense that he’d seen her outside the office.

Which meant he knew what she was driving and had probably followed her.

She wasn’t familiar with this part of town. She knew the main streets well enough to drive through them on her way from the apartment to the college, or from the office to the medical complex she’d first seen Dr. Frey. Basically, she knew how to get from one side to the other, but not enough to use the side streets to her advantage.

There were streetlights creating more shadows than illumination and deadened, closed buildings. It was too late at night for anything decent to be open, even in the main part of town. Behind the car, there was nothing but darkness. Two blocks ahead, if she squinted enough, she could barely make out what looked like neon lights.

With her luck, there might just be a place as classy as the Seventh Veil to help her out.

Her plan was to walk quickly and carefully, paying close attention to everything around her and staying close to the walls. She couldn’t breathe the further she got from the car. Maybe she could wait it out, maybe she could just sit in the car with the doors locked and wait until morning, or until the engine finally revved over.

_I’ll see you soon, Veronica._

Logan was going to kill her if her dad didn’t get to her first.

A car engine thrummed into the silence of the dark street and she turned her head enough to see the headlights dip and then blink off just behind the car she’d left almost a block away. Her heart stopped as she saw a figure get out of the driver’s seat and she flattened her back against the wall, sliding further away.

Her hand closed around the butt of the gun as she slipped around the corner.

Air hissed in through her lips as she breathed through an open mouth, making as little noise as possible as she tried to calm herself down. Blood was pumping loud in her ears and thick through the veins in the back of her skull, making her dizzy. She focused on the cold steel instead.

Footsteps began to echo slowly, closer and closer.

Veronica felt the rush of bile up her throat at the thought of him catching her again, at the thought of Mac and Weevil both in the hospital. She tried to remember exactly what the gym teacher had told them all that time in ninth grade when they’d done self defense.

SING.

Stomach. Instep. Nose. Groin. The four most vulnerable places on an attacker. Although, somehow, she severely doubted she was going to be attacked by a dummy wearing enough padding to put a sumo-wrestling fat suit to shame.

He stepped on a piece of paper, the rustling sounding too close to do anything but draw all the oxygen out of her lungs and tense her muscles, ready for action.

Veronica sprang the second she saw him turning the corner, pushing hard against his stomach and slamming him against the wall with a _hoof_ of breath. She suspected it was surprise more than any form of strength on her part. As she raised the gun and pointed it at his chest, she felt a rush of adrenaline and triumph shoot through her blood.

It didn’t last long.

***

“Veronica?”

She sat with her elbows resting on her knees and her head cradled in her hands.

“Yes, dad?”

She didn’t look up, preferring to stare at the floor between her feet.

“Will you… pride of my life … please explain one very simple thing to me?”

She could hear both disproval and disappointment in his voice and almost wished that he wouldn’t ask the very question he wanted to ask. Maybe if she clicked her heels and wished real hard, the floor beneath her would open up and swallow her entire body. Granted, yes, she’d never see Wallace, Mac, Logan, Weevil or Backup again. And she’d have to say goodbye to ever looking into her dad’s eyes again.

“Yes, dad.”

Then again, given the situation, that might be for the best.

“Why would you, sweet child of mine, point an unregistered, loaded firearm at Sheriff of this fine County?”

She shook her head, giving a slight groan before looking up at him through the bars of her cell.

“He snuck up on me?”

It was strange how even the tiniest of movements, such as the edges of his nostrils flaring when the rest of him was stone still, suggested fury of a magnitude she hadn’t met in her brief years and, by the looks of it, really didn’t want to.

“Are you making jokes, Veronica? I hope you’re not, because if you were really making jokes about the fact that you could face criminal charges…”

“No.” She stood up quickly, holding her hands out in supplication. “No jokes. I promise.”

He continued to glare.

“A gun? Which one of your brain cells was in charge of that decision? Pray tell? What happened to the thousands of healthy cells you’re supposed to have? Were they asleep? Did they black out?”

“I’m sorry.”

It was a very small whisper.

“I know you’re scared, honey.” His voice turned softer, gentler, but it was still firm and threaded with anger. “I know you probably thought there wasn’t any other choice for you, but I thought I’d taught you better than that. You had a concealed weapon without a license to carry said concealed weapon, you were carrying a weapon that has, for all intents and purposes, had the identification plates and numbers filed and then washed in acid. You are under twenty-one years of age… need I go on?”

She hoped that her eyes were sincere, that they managed to get through the extreme apology and regret she was trying to portray.

“You’re right, I wasn’t thinking. I wasn’t…”

The fingers of his right hand curled into themselves and she watches as each separate fingernail met his palm and closed in, his knuckles turning white with the pressure.

“Anybody else…”

He didn’t seem able to finish the sentence.

“I know.”

But she wasn’t going to get away that easy, she knew it, and so did he given the way his eyes flashed.

“You could have pulled that thing on anyone else, Veronica, but Donald Lamb? He’s been looking for an excuse to slap either one of us with criminal charges, you know it, and I’m afraid I just can’t stop him this time.”

“Dad…”

“I’m not going to ask where you got it.” He continued talking, even though they both knew. “It’s better for all involved if you don’t have a name, especially one with previous and existing charges under his belt, do you understand?”

The flush came too easily and she was reminded, yet again, that maybe she should listen to this man more often.

“Yes.”

She couldn’t help the small shiver. The cell was small and cold and gray and she’d never been on this side of it before. Now she understood the light that entered the eyes of whoever had been behind the bars when they got a visitor. She’d only been in there for an hour and she was ready to bow down and thank eight different deities for her dad visiting.

Anything to break the monotony of trying to decipher just why Big Joe had needed to declare his talent and proficiency with everyone’s mother in scrawled writing on the ceiling above the bunk. Veronica was fairly sure her mother couldn’t even _get_ into that position let alone in a cellblock without a cushion.

“Dad?” She was surprised at the shake in her voice. “What’s going to happen now?”

He sighed.

“I’ve got my best man on it.”

The words didn’t exactly fill her with confidence.

“Miss Mars!”

Sure enough, the next person to walk through the door made her smile.

“Cliff.” She gave a small nod. “Funny meeting you here.”

“No.” He lifted his briefcase up to balance on his left forearm and clicked it open with his right hand. “You want to hear something really funny? I was just at home, lying in my nice, comfortable, snuggly bed drifting off into a warm, sticky dream about things I’ll never tell you about and I happened to think to myself, ‘Gee it’s been a long time since somebody woke me up in the middle of the night to deal with a cranky sheriff and bogus charges, I wonder what that nice Mars girl is up to?’ And then what do you know? My phone rings.”

“Oh, just admit it.” She batted her eyelashes through the cell bars. “You love us, we keep things interesting. What would you without the Mars family on your retainer?”

His face lit up into a dreamy expression as he looked skyward.

“Oh, it’s such a happy place! I might cry.”

“Alright, alright.” Keith broke in with a stern voice, but there was humor glinting in his eyes. “Pressing legal issues now, playtime later.”

Cliff coughed to clear his throat.

“Yes, well, the gun’s mickey mouse. He’s got nothing to hold you on. In the state of California, you don’t need a license to own a gun, just to buy one, and since he didn’t catch you in the middle of paying for it, that’s a write off. You’re not actually supposed to walk around the streets with one, that’s a big no no, especially loaded, but given your circumstances, of which he was fully aware…”

“Wait.” Veronica frowned. “Circumstances? What do you mean, ‘aware’?”

Cliff sighed and Keith avoided her eyes.

“It is unlawful to carry a loaded rifle, shotgun, or handgun in any public place or on any public street in an incorporated area or an area where firing a firearm is prohibited. The exemption being: a person who reasonably believes that he or his property is in immediate danger and the weapon must be carried for ‘preservation’. That would be you.”

“He knows?” Her fingers curled around the bars as she glared at Keith. “How does he know?”

“When things started to escalate, I updated him on the situation.” Keith swallowed, and she wondered if it was guilt or nervousness. “In case something happened, something like…”

“This?” She finished for him. “So tonight, he was…?”

“When you wouldn’t answer my calls, I asked him to follow up on it.”

“Oh my god.” Her head fell forward and she pressed her forehead to the bars, trying to black out the whole night. “He was checking up on me?”

“Nobody’s wildly thrilled with the fact you had a weapon with all the identifying marks removed, but again, it’s not technically illegal unless you were trying to either buy it or sell it at the time.” Cliff pretended to frown. “You didn’t offer to let Lamb take it off your hands for a quick buck on the ride over here, did you?”

She shook her head, groaning against the metal.

“No.”

“Good.” He perked up. “Now all we have to worry about is the charge of assaulting a police officer. Did you really go for the stomach and wind him?”

She nodded and mumbled out her answer.

“Yes.”

“Oooh.” Cliff grinned. “What was that like?”

Veronica couldn’t help the small laugh and she looked up as she clasped her hands together.

“It’s such a happy place! I might cry.”

“Here.” Cliff thrust some papers and a pen at her before the vein in Keith’s neck could explode. “Sign these, I’m sure you know where, and then we’re all free to go home.”

She quirked her head to the side, frowning slightly.

“That’s it? What about ‘assaulting a police officer’? I was actually kinda proud of that one.”

“Veronica.”

Keith warned in a low voice and she lifted her hands in supplication again, pouting an apology for good measure.

“He’s got nothing.” Cliff supplied. “And he knows it. Unless, as I pointed out, he wants to file a bunch of reports stating he let a three-foot blonde midget get the better of him. Sign the papers before he changes his mind.”

“I am not short, I am small boned, thank you.” She muttered it as she scrawled the pen across the pages. “And why did he bring me all the way in here if he knew he wasn’t going to charge me with anything?”

False confusion crinkled Cliff’s brow.

“Because he’s mean?” He snapped the case closed and lowered it. “And really needs to get laid this century. Is that all, can I go?”

She grinned, bright and cheerful.

“Thanks Cliff! You’re the best.”

“Yeah.” He nodded at Keith. “I expect a large Christmas bonus. I’ll send Herr Lamb in with the keys as soon as he’s able. Toodles.”

“Wait!” She called as he reached the door. “Does this mean I don’t get my gun back?”

“Veronica!”

Cliff’s chuckle echoed down the hall as Keith set his face ready for another lecture.

“Well.” She tried smooth over the harsh edges with a touch of humor. “It wasn’t cheap, you know.”

“Don’t get me started, young lady, you crossed over a line tonight. If it were up to me, you wouldn’t have gotten away so easily. I still don’t know why Lamb did.”

It boiled up in her then, once Cliff was out of earshot and Lamb wasn’t sneering at her through the bars of his patrol car, the leftover dregs of adrenaline that were swirling around somewhere in her body still, sluggish lumps of it that made her shudder.

“How about ‘cause I’m still alive?” Maybe it was too harsh and too sudden, but she couldn’t help herself. “He’s out there, dad, and he’s not going away. He’s in my phone and he was saying stuff, he’s been watching me.”

“Your phone?” His whole face pricked to attention. “What do you mean, your phone?”

“He must have programmed it when he was in my room that time.” She made sure to be watching him carefully when she said it, enunciating each word. “In. My. Room.”

It was his turn to flush a guilty red, all up his neck and into the roots of his hair.

“Veronica…”

“When we get it back from these fine officers of the law, you can check for yourself.” Even she had her limits and she brushed over his apology quickly. “It’s not a name, just symbols, and he put in a special ring tone for it. His voice, calling my name.”

Just the memory of it made her shiver.

“He’s been in the apartment, dad.” She couldn’t stop it. “And my car. And the office. He knows who my friends are. He knows what appointments I have and where. How am I supposed to walk out of here? How do I know he hasn’t gotten to your car next?”

“Look at me.” He insisted. “I’m here and I’m fine. He hasn’t done anything to my car.”

She rolled her eyes.

“And where is it now? Outside, alone. He could be doing anything to it, putting anything in it.” She gave a slightly hysterical snort of air. “I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but maybe I’m safer in here.”

“I thought you wanted to face him.” Keith looked at her expectantly. “Isn’t that what all this was about? You running off to do the noble thing and save the rest of us?”

Her eyes narrowed.

“And you’re bringing logic into this? That’s just rude.”

“Look.” He insisted. “If we’re going to do this, if we’re going to stop him at all, it has to be together. Do you hear me? No more running off to investigate things without telling me, no more bringing outside friends in to supply illegal firearms. Is any of this sinking in?”

She looked at the ground again.

“Yes.”

“When are you going to realize?” It was a low sigh and it sounded just a little bit sad. “We work better together.”

“In my defense, you started it.” She pointed her finger at him. “Hiding secret files from me and looking into things behind my back.”

“The money.” He nodded. “You found where it came from? Lyle got it from his sister and, from what I could tell, she got it from a numbered account. I haven’t been able to identify it yet, but I’m looking into where it went after Lyle disappeared.”

“The numbered account?” She really didn’t want to finish the sentence, but she had to. “It’s Logan’s.”

***  



	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There was something dreadful about what she was about to do.

*~*~*~*

She shivered, not entirely sure if the air around her had turned cold or the tremble came from within. Veronica looked down at the tiles, her toes wooshing into view, right then left, over the little squares. The tiles were an ugly, muted green shade that she felt would probably make her nauseous if she looked at them for too long, but she couldn’t bring herself to raise her head.

A large form pushed past her and she shrank back, inhaling sharply as she brought her arms in close to her body.

Immediately she felt Keith rise up behind her, felt his hand on her shoulder, and she breathed easier as they continued down the hall. There were too many people making too much noise and she didn’t have enough energy to keep track of them all, machines beeped and rubber soled shoes squeaked and people spoke in secretive little huddles, their heads bowed together.

Her wrist felt heavy as she lifted it to knock on the door.

Wallace, at least, seemed to speak in quiet, muted tones as he answered and she wasn’t exactly sure whose benefit that was for as they pushed the door open and squeezed through, her own frazzled mental state, his, or the form on the bed.

“Hey, V.”

She was limp and pliant as Wallace pulled her in for a hug. Like his voice, the rest of him was gentle and cautious, as if he didn’t quite want to scare the wild animal skittering off into the woods. Not that she minded, much, all her attention was focused on the bed.

Mac.

“She hasn’t woken up?”

Even Keith talked as if the hospital room was a library.

“Yeah.” Wallace rushed to answer. “She did for a bit, but she was out of it, didn’t really make much sense. Now she’s sleeping again.”

There was an ugly bruise running down the right side of her face and Veronica stepped forward to look more closely at it.

“Let me guess?” Her hands twisted up close to her sternum, making her elbows stick out. “They said she knocked herself out when she crashed, hit her head on the windscreen?”

Keith shrugged in sympathy as he reached for the file attached to the foot of Mac’s bed.

“Something like that.” He flicked through it easily. “But they did a tox screen and found high amounts of Ketamine.”

“Keta…?” Her question died off as realization struck. “K? He doped her up on K?”

The walls of the small room suddenly became the most interesting thing Wallace and Keith had ever seen, apparently, as they both avoided making eye contact with her, red faced and penitent. She watched them take deep breaths, Wallace eyeing Keith for any clue as to how to respond.

“Yes.” Keith finally admitted.

She was not going to let it go that easily.

“And he did the same to me, didn’t he?” It was one step forward, toward her father, and she could feel Wallace watching them both. “Didn’t he?”

He held out his hand and she didn’t blink, didn’t even register the movement as she folded her arms across the front of her body, the tips of her nails pressing slightly into the pouch of her biceps.

“Veronica. Just calm down a minute, okay?” It came out soft and soothing. “Yes. It looks that way. If I had to guess, I would say that yes, you were also under the…”

He said her name, she knew it; he said it to keep her in the game, to keep her from flying off the handle and doing something she was going to regret. People always said her name to stave off the hysteria when they thought she was reaching it.

She knew she had to keep her head, knew that things were about to get impossibly difficult and the last thing any of them could afford was her giving in to any of the thousand emotions that were currently flickering through her blood fighting for attention.

“I knew.” It was a hiss and an accusation. “I knew something… and you said… you made me think…”

It was like ice sliding up her spine, spreading out through all the nerves and tingling against the inside of her skin, making her shiver.

“I knew.” Her voice was close to breaking. “In my car. In my room. And you made me go to a shrink!”

“We didn’t know, Veronica.” The whole room seemed to shrink down as he stepped forward and she stepped back. “And I’m sorry for not believing you then, we all are, but we didn’t know. There was no way we could have known.”

Wallace coughed in the corner.

“He’s right, I mean, it was kinda sus with Aaron being dead and all.”

She gave Wallace a brief glare of annoyance before turning back to Keith.

“You didn’t know, but you could have trusted me.”

A soft knock on the door stole all their breaths and Veronica turned slowly to see a nurse poking her head inside. She felt her heart sinking, further and further, and just wanted to close her eyes and fold herself up on the bed.

“Excuse me, Mr. Mars?” The nurse gave a nervous smile. “You wanted me to tell you if anything happened to Mr. Navarro downstairs in emergency? There’s been a disturbance…”

“Yes.” Keith nodded with a tight, reassuring nod. “Thank you, yes.”

When the door closed, Veronica felt all the oxygen slip out of the room. Her lungs seemed to shrink impossibly tight and she gripped her arms closer, hugging herself. She could feel both their eyes on her and she couldn’t stay angry as all the heat in her body fell out through the soles of her feet.

“This is it.” Keith turned his anxious eyes to her. “Are you sure you’re ready?”

Veronica bit her lip.

“No.” Her voice was impossibly small. “Never.”

“C’mon.” His hand was warm when it landed on her shoulder. “It’s just like we talked about in the car. You’ll be okay, I promise.”

Her body felt stiff and resistant when he turned her around and they began walking towards the door. She wasn’t sure if she could do this and come out of it unscathed. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to find out.

***

The nauseating green of the floor tiles gave way to sterile grey paper and she closed her eyes as the elevator closed its doors. Even as she felt Wallace and her father surrounding her, Veronica shivered against the chill.

There was something completely dreadful about what she was about to do.

The last three years of her life had been nothing short of violently traumatic. There was nothing she could do to change that, nothing she could do to stop the things that would inevitably happen. The only thing she had control over was her own reactions to them.

When Lilly had died, she had grieved. When her dad was thrown out of office, she kept her silent vigil with him. When the entire school turned around to attack, she turned the other cheek. When her mother left, she sighed and turned further towards her dad. When she was raped, she let Lamb laugh at her and never said a thing to anyone.

Her passivity tasted like thick ash, coating the inside of her mouth with bitter tar.

It continued all the way through her mother’s second and third and continual, never-ending betrayals, Duncan’s lying, Duncan leaving, her friends battering her back and forth, everyone she knew chipping slowly away at her until there was nothing left.

She didn’t open her eyes, but she couldn’t stop her ears tracking the quiet woosh of the elevator down past all the floors. Her stomach lurched at the sudden pull of them slowing down to the final stop. The first floor.

There were few people in her life she trusted completely, that she would do anything for without asking. She could count them on one hand, with fingers to spare. They hadn’t always been perfect, but they had been there for her through all of it. They knew her better than anyone. Her father. Wallace. Logan. That was it, although she was slowly working on Mac and Weevil.

Logan had been with her through the worst of it; he’d been the cause of some of it. She couldn’t imagine him ever doing anything to hurt her, not now, not after all they’d been through. But she had also thought that of him before Lilly died and he’d proved her wrong then.

“I can’t do this.” Her feet stalled, toes inching for purchase against the smooth floor. “I just can’t.”

Her father’s hands at her shoulders tightened slightly and she felt their warmth.

“It’s okay.” He whispered to her. “We’re here, it’ll be okay. I promise you.”

“But…” She struggled in earnest, pushing him away, trying to get enough room to breathe. “I can’t…”

Immediately, his hands fell away and she stood there, alone and desperate in the middle of the hallway. Her hand inched out, to the left, until she could feel the wall, until her fingertips pressed against something solid. She could feel the first knuckles bend back and imagined the right angles her fingers made. It was distinct and real and unmoving, the wall, something solid when she felt herself about to break open.

Wallace and her dad watched from a foot away.

She thought about Lilly and breathed in.

“Okay.” Her head snapped up and her hand left the wall. “I’m ready.”

***

“Excuse me!” They heard the voices before they got to the Emergency doors. “You can’t be here!”

It sounded like a scuffle, like they were already getting physical, and Veronica picked up the pace. She had brief images of security guards and nightsticks and couldn’t handle the large, choking knot in her throat.

There was only a slight relief when she turned the corner and saw only a doctor, two nurses and an orderly by the curtain surrounding Weevil’s cubicle. Veronica barely glanced at the hand she could see resting on the bed inside. Instead, she looked at the figure everyone was trying to maneuver out of the ward.

He looked angry, he looked confrontational, he looked exactly like he did when he’d made her life a living hell.

“Logan.”

The instant he heard her, she saw him deflate, saw all the fight drain out of him as he turned to look at her. She couldn’t really meet his eyes, too afraid to see what would be in there. She felt like a coward.

“Veronica.” He said it like a sigh, like the relief she couldn’t feel. “Oh, god, you’re here. You’re safe.”

She clutched the edges of her elbows closer to her body, stepping back when he stepped forward.

“Don’t, Logan, just don’t.”

His whole posture screamed confusion, she could taste it just from the outlines she could see, she didn’t need to focus. If she didn’t know better, if she didn’t know how deftly and completely he could fool an audience, she wouldn’t have believed it was an act.

“What?” He stepped forward again and Veronica raised her eyes to look at the orderly behind him. “Veronica, what did I do?”

It was a quick shake of her head and a bite of her lip, but it seemed to calm the man, seemed to stay his hand for a little while at least. As long as he didn’t get physical, Veronica was sure that she could handle Logan without involving anyone else. Emotional scars notwithstanding.

“We found the bank accounts, Logan.” Without knowing how, she managed to keep her voice steady; despite the gelatinous mess her insides were in. “We know the money came from you.”

“What?” He actually looked lost for a second, like he didn’t know exactly what she was talking about. Then comprehension dawned over his face and she could have cried at the way his expression fell. “Veronica, no. No, you can’t be serious…”

He stepped towards her again and Veronica forgot to step back. She let his hand grip her elbow and she could feel comfort and tenderness and concern in his touch. The whole thing nearly came undone then and there.

“Let me go.” Her voice cracked then, breaking slightly. “I can’t believe you would do that to me.”

“Please.” If there was anything she couldn’t take right then, it was the sound of him begging her like that, the sound of his voice reaching in and tugging at her. “Please, Veronica, you can’t…”

“After everything!” It came, spat out of her mouth like venom. “You said… and I believed you…”

Against her better judgment, Veronica looked into his eyes and what she saw there twisted her insides. It was a mistake; she knew it when she felt all her resolve melting. She felt like reaching out to grab him and leaning forward whisper the words ‘I’m sorry’ into his ear over and over again. She wanted to feel his arms around her.

Logan took her elbow again, pulling her in, his fingers closing tightly over her skin.

“I’d never hurt you.”

He whispered it into the top of her hair and she let him, closing her eyes for just a second to fall into the fantasy, before the rest of the world came back into focus. Loud voices and harsh words, people pulling them apart.

“Get away from my daughter, Logan.”

She was shaking so hard she didn’t think she could stop.

“I can’t.” For the second time that night, she fought her father’s hands, pushing them away and skidding out of his reach. “I’m sorry, I can’t…”

As she pushed her way through the growing crowd of people, she heard the distinct sound of her father ordering the guards to take Logan into custody and down to the Sheriff’s office. Her feet slapped hard on the nauseous green tile as she fled.

***

Veronica panted hard with her back to the little brick wall petition.

It was dark and eerily silent. To her left she could see the faint neon glow of the hospital’s entrance and the small hum of crowds and movement peeking around the corner, but it was quiet where she was. And the silence seemed to press down in on her.

Logan wouldn’t hurt her. He’d sacrifice himself before that would ever happen.

She said the words to herself over and over again. Until they began to run together, until they were bled free of any coherence they might have once had. Her knees were weak and barely able to keep her upright. Her hands trembled and she shook them out, trying to dislodge the nerves and adrenalin that surged through her veins.

Her heart wouldn’t stop thundering inside her chest and she was fairly sure that couldn’t be healthy.

He came out of nowhere.

She knew he would. The arms surged around her, one hand over her mouth and one snapped tightly around her arms, pinioning her to his body and making it impossible to move. His chest heaved against the ribs of her back as she tried not to struggle.

And failed.

“That was quite a show you put on, Veronica.” His voice was hot and fetid in her ear and she tried not to whimper. “Really, I’m impressed.”

His thumb pressed the gum of her top lip hard against her jaw and she struggled to pull it up and away, baring her teeth enough to clamp down on his skin. He hissed as he pulled away.

“So you should be.” It came out like a hiss. “You fell for it.”

She could feel the return of his hand like a rush of air coming at her face and flinched, expecting the blow.

“I wouldn’t.” Veronica had to cry out loud when she finally heard Keith’s voice and saw the beam of the flashlight. “Put her down, Aaron.”

There was something wrong and Veronica couldn’t pick out what it was. She squinted into the bright pinpoint of light and saw her father with a gun pointed straight at them, his eyes were tight with worry and concentration. Even under pressure, she trusted him to shoot straight.

It was the only reason she’d allowed them to put this apple on her head in the first place.

But that wasn’t it. It was the feel of a small rumble behind her, the roll of laughter inside Aaron’s chest.

“Sure, Keith.” The arms around her relaxed and Veronica frowned as her feet touched the ground. “Anything you sa…”

The gun went off before Aaron finished and Veronica barely had time to register that the sound hadn’t come from a point ahead of her, but beside her, before she saw the flashlight tumble over itself, the light spilling in gruesome circles up and down and around.

She saw Keith fall in the strobe light.

“Dad!”

She didn’t manage to get more than one step before the arms closed around her again.

“Tsk, tsk, Veronica.” Aaron chuckled into her ear. “That was rude.”

A sharp prick scratched along her neck and she felt herself go weak.

***  



	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In some distant part of his mind, Wallace had always somewhat resented Logan for pulling the hero act, for getting all the glory, and now, now he believed that part of him had been on crack and Logan could keep his hero title, because this? This was not cool.

*~*~*~*

There were stars above her.

“The wheh…” She reached her hand out to them, but it only slapped against glass. “The well…”

They rumbled underneath her, around and around, to a count that escaped her brain. A count that made her dizzy, which made her frown, so she left it alone, gave herself up to the feel of movement and speed. Her fingers tapped a rhythm on the glass, looking for a way around it; she needed to reach those stars.

“Hmm?”

“The wheeeeeels…” Her brain finally supplied the right word and she half hiccuped, half sung it out loud in triumph, a half forgotten nursery rhyme. “On the bus… go round… and round.”

“Yes, Veronica.” A sickly sweet voice encouraged. “They certainly do.”

Something in that voice made her want to fall right through the glass and out into the sky.

“The wheeeeeeels…”

They continued driving and the wheels kept turning.

***

He lay on the ground and gasped.

Once.

Twice.

It hurt, ripped through his chest like ragged pieces of glass slashing at his lungs. Dust swirled around his face, loose packed earth that echoed in the breaths he tried to minimize. He was face down in the dirt and could see nothing but earth, sharp blades of grass and a thick, sickening pool of red spreading wider and wider.

“Mr. Mars!” Footsteps thumped hard nearby and he blinked. “Mr. Mars!”

“Aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhh.”

His throat scratched dry and sore as he tried to form the word.

“Help!” Wallace sounded like he was far away. “Somebody help us!”

“Aaaaaaaaaarraaaaaa…”

More footsteps pounded closer, the familiar sounds of voices taking over and a gurney being lowered. Hands gloved in white latex gripped his shoulders gently and firmly, rolling him over.

He grunted with the pain and tried not to pass out.

“Aaarronnnnn.”

“Relax, Mr. Mars.” Came an unfamiliar voice. “You need to calm down.”

In the frame of the blank faces crowding him, fuzzed out and light blue uniforms, pressing padded gauze into the front of his chest and tearing the front of his shirt, Keith could see Wallace staring at him with an open mouth.

“Got her.” He gasped, locking eyes with Wallace, using his last bit of strength to push his arm between the bodies and gesture to the ground. “Aaron. He took…”

Wallace frowned and the people counted out a rhythm as they hefted him onto the cool, white-sheeted gurney. Keith held out as long as he could, pointing back down to the ground and hoping that Wallace understood.

“My guh…”

“Mr. Mars?” Came the order. “We need you to relax, now, ok? You’re only making this worse.”

At the sight of Wallace ducking down amid the chaos and bustle, Keith finally closed his eyes and let the blackness swarm in. He only hoped the boy knew how to point and shoot.

***

Something wasn’t right. She could feel it.

It sank into her belly with every moment that passed. Her head felt thick and cumbersome and she had trouble keeping her eyes open. She couldn’t concentrate on anything, the edges of the world were dark and they closed in on her.

“I… Ineedto… togo.” The thought came to her and she grabbed hold of it. “Icou… I shou runnn.”

He chuckled again and it made her sick.

“That’s a very good idea, Veronica. I highly recommend it.”

The car stopped and she felt the engine die beneath her. Her hand batted at the window, but it didn’t give. Her fingers felt fat and useless as she scratched at it.

“Runawaaaaaaay.”

“You really should, I don’t think you want to be here with me at all.”

She brought her hand up, thumping it clumsily against her chest, grappling at the belt that had been secured there. It struggled against her, getting tighter as she tried to hook her fingers under it, tried to pull it away. Slowly, it seemed, she followed the line of it down to her hip and fumbled at the buckle.

“Tell me.” He sounded cocky beside her. “Can you walk at all?”

The belt sizzled up past her face as it broke free and she felt herself slump forward, crumpling into a pile.

“Nooooo.” She felt like crying. “I’m trying.”

“That’s alright.” A rush of cold air accompanied the sound of his door opening. “How about I come around to your side and help you?”

Blood pounded inside her brain, sluggish and thick and all encompassing. All she could do was try to breathe and close her eyes, try to understand why her brain was throwing random words at her. Words like Lilly and Logan and Fire and Run and Please and Help.

Footsteps echoed loudly around the car and they sounded like little death knells.

She fumbled one last time, her hand slapping awkwardly against the window and sliding down to the material of the door, but then she heard it. A soft, sharp snick, the central locking sliding into motion.

“Veronica!” The cheer had gone from his voice. “Veronica, open the door!”

All she could do was slump back against the seat and pull air into her lungs. It was hard to breathe, suddenly, and it felt like her airways were on fire, closing up inside her chest and refusing to cooperate.

“Veronica!”

She screamed when he slammed against the door next to her head. It was a gust of air, one short, sharp exhalation and then she was back to gasping. Squinting out the window, she could see him rearing back to hit again.

Lurching sideways, she slumped towards the other side of the car, reaching for the wheel, for the ignition.

“Open the door!” The collision rocked the car on its wheels, making it bounce in sickening waves. “You don’t want to make me mad, Veronica!”

Her fingers fumbled at the keys and her hip slid awkwardly into the space between the two front seats, jamming her there. One twist yielded nothing and she groaned out loud at the violent slamming of his fist against the window.

“Open the door, you stupid little bitch!”

A second twist gave a splutter and she closed her eyes, pleading with a vague, fuzzy image of the statue her Grandma Mars used to keep on the mantle of her study, a statue she hadn’t believed in since she was nine years old and her mother sat her down to explain the basics of organized religion.

The engine roared to life as she turned the keys for a third time and she began to fumble at the gear shift sticking into her waist, trying to push it into obedience. She heard it before she felt it, the slow crunch of gravel underneath the tires, the lurch of the car moving.

“Veronica!”

She slumped between the seats, breathing hard as she let herself relax.

The car rolled backwards, gaining momentum, and she watched the play of stars through the windscreen as Aaron’s face disappeared from view. Small, distant, little balls of light that blurred and trembled and danced in dizzying rhythms. She couldn’t tell up from down and the only thing stopping her from falling further was the fact she was wedged between the seats.

She didn’t have the time or capacity to understand what the branches sliding into view in the windscreen meant before the impact. A sudden, loud, jarring crash and she was propelled through the front seats and into the back.

Her shoulder thudded slowly in protest and all she could do was bury herself further into the cushions, her hands looking for purchase. She hooked her fingers around the edge of the seat and tried to pull herself down, tried to wedge herself down in the legroom behind the front seats.

“You stupid…” She heard him panting as he jogged to the car. “… little bitch.”

She whimpered as she clawed uselessly at the carpeted floor, trying for escape.

Shards of glass exploded above her, raining down over her back and legs.

“I told you…” The door opened with a violent wrench and she felt a hand close down around her ankle. “… to open the goddamn door.”

He easily ducked her clumsy attempts to kick him, grabbing her free leg with his other hand. She tried to scream, but it came out more like a muffled sob, a small pathetic whimper as she felt herself being dragged up and out of the car.

Her hip scraped against the glass and his grip was like a vice as he used the momentum of her legs to turn her around, turn her face up. She saw the angry twist of his face as he leaned over her, dropping her legs to slump outside the open door as she lay over the back seat.

“Nnnnnnnn…” She pleaded as she tried to shake her head. “Puhleeeeee…”

“Now that?” He grinned down at her, kneeling in the space between her legs and closing his fingers around her throat. “Is more like it.”

“Maaaaa…” Her hands clawed weakly against the thick-corded veins of his forearms. “Mac knows…”

Veronica saw stars before she passed out.

***

Logan was used to being restricted and restrained.

He was used to shutting the hell up and entertaining himself by staring at non-existent patterns in walls as men larger than him decided what they needed or wanted to do with him to compensate for the lack of whatever the hell they were lacking.

The two burly security guards had parked him on the narrow plastic chairs nailed to the wall in the waiting room just outside the emergency room as they loitered cautiously nearby, sipping cafeteria coffee from Styrofoam cups as they waited for the patrol car they’d called over. It didn’t really matter. It wasn’t as if he was about to fight them.

The whole point of him acting like a total raging jackass in front of the entire ER, putting Veronica through more hell, was that he would be quite visibly taken out of the equation. No matter what happened with Keith and Veronica out there, Logan couldn’t be blamed in a court of law for it if he was under arrest at the time. That and flushing Aaron out of his holding pattern.

Tiny shoots of panic screeched up his spine and he had to grit his jaw shut at the very thought of his father returning.

He’d almost thought that he’d finally found some sort of resolution when it came to Aaron. He could still feel the tightening in his chest when he’d heard the news, when they’d come to inform him that his father lay dead in the morgue.

It had a been a strange mix of sorrow and joy, freedom surging through him at the same time as the definite, unchangeable fact that he was _parentless_ , an orphan in the strictest sense of the word and, aside from Trina, he had no real family left. Nothing and nobody with any blood ties.

Part of that felt good, it felt like finally being able to breathe. The knowledge sang through him, the fact that he would never have to go through anything as bad as he had as a child, that he’d never have to survive another night under Aaron Echolls’ rage. It had seemed unreal.

Looking at the shell of his father’s body had been eerie. The grand and fierce, this bogey man inside his head, suddenly become small and hollow, an empty carcass of blood and scraps on a table. He had exhaled nearly two decades worth of pain and looked up, saying without hesitation that it was, in fact, Aaron Echolls.

Then he had gone home with Veronica and let her hold him until they had fallen asleep, her hand sweeping patterns up and down his back and his ankles twining with hers. Not even Keith had interrupted.

They had become his family, Keith and Veronica.

He’d finally been happy.

It really made perfect sense that Aaron would return to screw that up for him.

Veronica’s voice still rang inside his head, tired and worn and pleading over the cell phone.

_It all leads to you._

_I’m not doing this, Veronica, I can’t…_

_Everything, Logan, all of it. His trails all lead to you. He’s setting you up; don’t you get that? All of it, the attacks on me, the murder, the payoffs, any court of law would put you away._

_I’m not putting you out there like bait!_

_And I’m not letting you take the fall for him! This way we’ll have the upper hand, we’ll know he’ll be coming… Dad has a plan…_

_But…_

_But you need to be out of it. You need an airtight alibi. You need police witnesses that no one will argue._

_Veronica…_

_Dad has a plan. Logan, please, I need this to be over, I need to finish it._

The sudden crash of people bursting through the doors made him look up. Despite heavy promises from television and ER episodes, the emergency waiting room was generally not an interesting place. There were rows upon rows of plastic chairs, a window in which sat a surly guy in his late twenties reading a magazine, only briefly looking up to ask questions of whatever poor soul happened to stumble in, several people sitting and waiting in various states of distress ranging from what looked and sounded like a mere sniffle to a guy holding a bloody rag to the side of his face.

All the really dramatic shit was brought in through the ambulance bay around the other side.

Until now.

A crowd of people rushed a gurney through the hall, loud voices shouting orders to each other and directing traffic. Logan caught the brief hints of words like ‘GSW’ and ‘tachycardic’ and ‘initially conscious’.

And then, for a brief second, the people parted and he saw who was strapped to the bed.

“Keith!” He couldn’t help yelling it as he jumped and began running. “Keith!”

“Woah there, son.” Large arms came around him, grabbing him from behind. “You’re not going anywhere.”

“But…” He struggled hard, earning nothing but a tighter grip and more force. “I have to go…”

A kneecap hit him hard in the back of his knee and he felt himself stumble. The floor came up to meet his face quickly as a foot landed thickly in the middle of his back.

“You have to go to the Sheriff department, is where you have to go.”

He fought the hands reaching for his wrists, fought them hard, but it was no use. He felt the crisp click of the cuffs being secured.

“You don’t understand…” He pleaded. “Something went wrong.”

“Oh, I understand.” The second guard assigned to him knelt down and lifted his chin. “You got caught is what happened. Let’s go.”

They picked him up by the cuffs and none too gently stood him right way up, pushing him towards the door and away from the people disappearing through the large plastic dividers between the ER and the waiting room.

Logan came face to face with Wallace.

“Where’s Veronica?” He gasped. “Where is she?”

The guards hauled him off towards the waiting deputies by the patrol car that had just shown up before Wallace could answer. Logan struggled hard all the way and earned himself a strained shoulder for his trouble.

Wallace’s face had said more than any words could have.

***

Warmth.

That was the first thing that registered.

She twitched her legs and felt the weight of the blanket. It didn’t feel like hers, it felt lighter and thinner, but full of purpose. There was sweat pooling underneath her arms and it made the cool, crisp sheet cling to her when she tried to move.

The second thing that came into focus was the way her forearms dragged.

They caught and pulled when she tried to move them. It hit her like a brick, the sudden panic that she’d been tied down, the fear that surged through her. It came back to her like a shadowed figure walking towards her car.

Sound was the third.

Soft, regular beeping and the low hum of machinery. Her fingers inched out a little more and closed around thin, cold tubes. Tubes that were attached to her wrists. Her lungs automatically expanded and she released a long, heavy breath before opening her eyes.

Mac blinked in the sudden brightness.

She was in a hospital room and she was alone.

A quick scan of herself, from what she could see and feel, reassured her that she wasn’t badly injured as far as she knew. Her head ached, but that made sense out of everything else that didn’t. She was in a hospital room, not in her car frantically trying to turn the ignition as the engine hissed underneath a crinkled bonnet. She wasn’t cowering from the burst of glass from the window and she wasn’t clenching her teeth from the pain as someone’s hand twisted in her hair and yanked so hard on her neck that she almost couldn’t breathe as he demanded to know what she knew.

Her fingers scrambled at her side until she found what television had promised her would be there.

The big red call button at the end of a long, white electrical cord.

“Miss Mackenzie?” She didn’t have to wait long. It was either a quite night or she was worse off than she first thought. “You’re awake. I’ll page a doctor to come look…”

“Was I alone?” Mac gasped out, surprised at the dryness of her throat. “There wasn’t anyone with me?”

The nurse who had walked through the door and immediately smiled the patently fake smile of reassurance at seeing her awake, appeared surprised as she took in the apparent emptiness of the room.

“Actually, yes. A Mr. Mars brought you in, he said your parents couldn’t be contacted, and Mr. Fennel was staying by your side pretty religiously all night. I think Mr. Mars brought his daughter in to see you for a little while, as well, but I don’t know…”

“I need them.” Mac interrupted, impatient and confused. “I need to talk to them, I need…”

Concern flooded the nurse’s face.

“Well, I can try to have them paged over the PA system.” She suggested doubtfully. “If they’re still inside the hospital, they should hear it.”

It wasn’t much, but it was the best Mac was going to get.

“Thank you.”

They needed to know.

***

_She was falling._

_Falling and floating and staying still all at the same time._

_She was in a jungle. Large trees and sweeping vines towered over her and closed in to the point of stealing her breath. Water dripped down dark trunks and pooled at her feet, splashing over her ankles and making her legs sticky. Grass and bushes and thorns rose up out of the darkness and scratched at her bare skin._

_Between the large leaves were flashes of pink that she could almost taste, flashes that made her want to run after them. Her breath was shallow as she tried to move forward, tried to chase the little, teasing glimpses of color that flitted in and out of her view as she batted limb after limb out of her way._

_She couldn’t even understand what was so appealing about them, but she knew that if she didn’t catch them, didn’t hold them in her hand, she would never forgive herself._

_Laughter, eerie and empty and echoing all around her, tickled the edges of her ears and frustrated her. She knew she should recognize it, but the source eluded her._

_“Who are you?”_

_But the only answer she got was more giggling and the sense that she was chasing shadows._

_Her head spun and she tasted salt and copper._

_“Who?” She stumbled onto her knees and choked, reaching her hand out to a nearby fern, her fingers closing around the rough, furry trunk. “Tell me… who?”_

_Then the giggling stopped and she heard a voice._

_“You can’t be here, Veronica Mars.”_

_Her brain cleared and she forced herself back onto her feet, pulling herself up by grabbing fistfuls of overhanging leaves._

_“Lilly?” She cried desperately. “Lilly, where are you?”_

_The answer came back firmly, more defined than before, and it hit her like a slap in the face._

_“Just go away, Veronica.”_

_“Lilly!”_

_The jungle surged and eddied, bulging in and out against her like a living entity. She could swear that it was laughing at her, amused at her desperation. It felt like the leaves were shaking with it, wrapping themselves around her arms and legs, trying to stop her moving forward._

_She fought them; she fought them hard._

_“Wait for me!”_

_Suddenly, the trees and leaves and vines parted, clearing away in front of her and she had to catch herself from falling over the precipice she found herself at. The rocky cliffs fell down in a sharp angle, jagged and rough, and over a hundred feet deep._

_Lilly was lying at the bottom._

_“Go away, Veronica.” The words came out, clear and distinct, but Lilly’s mouth never moved. “You can’t follow me here.”_

_“But…” It was a gasp, a breath, and she tried not to fall over with confusion as she stared down. “I miss you.”_

_Lilly was dressed in pink, but the color oozing out on the rocks underneath her was all red._

_“I don’t want you here.” Lilly hissed. “Don’t you get it? Stay away from me. You’re getting yourself dirty.”_

_She looked down and saw that the puddles of water she’d been splashing in were thick with blood._

_She wanted to cry._

_“But what about me?”_

_And Lilly glared._

_“You need to wake up, Veronica.”_

_There was a snap and Lilly’s face was right in front of her, angry and vicious and hateful. She gasped against the vine that wound itself around her waist and dug into the front of her abdomen._

_“WAKE UP!”_

Veronica stared blankly at the rocky cliff face, gasping for breath, trying to understand where she was. Her hands closed automatically against the vine cutting into her belly and she felt the strange sensation of wood. She looked down to see the rail that was the only thing stopping her from tumbling.

A memory flashed at her: her hands grasping and feet scrabbling trying not to fall.

Just as she turned, looking back to confirm where she was, she caught the sickening sight of Aaron walking casually after her. A glint of amusement in his eyes.

“Well, aren’t you just a creature of habit, Veronica?”

Her lungs were practically bursting and she tried to steady her breath. Her arms itched and she saw scratches on them from the trees she had, apparently, just stumbled through to get away from him. She thought of the vision she’d just had, the sight of Lilly’s broken body lying at the bottom.

“I mean.” He continued walking towards her, casual step after casual step, not particularly worried about speed. “I suppose I should at least thank you for waiting until I was out of the car before you crashed it this time, yes? And then you run right here.”

Her back pressed deep into the wood and she wanted to run, but there was nowhere to go, not when one step would have her toppling. She was still unsteady on her feet.

“It’s like you read my mind.” His grin, feral and triumphant and hungry, was enough to make her choke. “What else did you see in there?”

“Geddaway fromme!”

But it was useless, her muscles were already protesting, sliding down off her skeletal frame without her permission. Her hands clutching at the wooden rail were the only things keeping her upright and she tried not to look across, tried not to see anything that made her skin itch and crawl and burn, made her throat close up.

He chuckled.

“You were just calling for Lilly.” His voice was particularly cruel as she began to slump down again. “Tell me, did she answer?”

“No.” It wasn’t particularly a denial as she shook her head, more of a plea as he came to stand right in front of her. “No.”

He crouched down, resting his wrists on top of his knees, and smiled at her.

“I don’t know why not, the quality of stuff I shot you with, you should be seeing JFK, Elvis and Amelia Earhart. How does it feel?”

His hand came down lightly on her knee and she scrambled out of his reach, pushing her back harder against the railing.

“K?” She managed. “You gave itto me, liethem?”

She flinched when he chuckled again.

“Oh no. Not you.” The corners of his eyes crinkled. It was the exact expression that millions of fans sighed over when they watched him on the big screen. “That was for them, to knock them out. Granted, yes, the office dose was meant for you, but the way that whole thing worked out was just fortuitous, don’t you think?”

Above her, the stars danced and she tried to clear her head.

“But you?” And this time there was no space to move back as he reached out to close his hand around her knee. “No, I just made sure you’d be incoherent and easy to manage. Really, when you think about it, there’s just no point to you being out of it, is there? How will I hear you scream?”

She blinked slowly.

“Bu…?”

He held her leg down with one hand as he reached forward with the other. Veronica threw her head back to escape him and the railing slammed into her skull.

“That wasn’t the drug.” His fingers traced slowly against her throat in a seemingly casual and gentle manner, but she could feel the threat in his touch. “Seems I got a little rough before. Sorry about that.”

He sounded anything but.

***

Wallace’s heart pounded faster than he could ever remember it being, beating hard and then harder against the inside of his rib cage as he stood there.

He didn’t know what to do and he didn’t like it.

The curtain had been drawn closed, a pale attempt at privacy and discretion, and all the staff that had originally crowded the bed hours before were gone. He remembered meeting Keith here in the hall, watching stunned as the doctors fought to revive, or at least halt the decline of Weevil.

Eli Navarro, ex gang leader and parole for a major felon, lay motionless and vulnerable on the gurney, a bare oxygen mask the only testament to the effort that had been made earlier.

He was stable, that much Wallace knew, could understand from the hurried answer he’d gotten off the nurse, subject to regular checks from the doctor until he woke up and further medical assessments could be performed.

They seemed hopeful that no permanent damage had been done.

Wallace, on the other hand, had all but forgotten the meaning of the word hopeful. He was Veronica’s best friend and over the space of two years, he had had his fair share of drama. He’d been there for the aftermath of the first Aaron attack, the repercussions of Shelley’s party, the disaster that had been her trying to rebuild. He’d heard vague references, in her shaky voice that told him much more than her scant words ever could, of the River Stix. She’d been devastated after the bus crash, after the trial, after graduation and that horrible night on the roof of the Grand.

He had been there for the aftermath of nearly all of it and he was proud to own the title of best friend.

But he’d never stood in the middle of the action while it all went down, he’d never had the knowledge that as he stood, the very next breath he took, might be the very last second of her life. He’d never lived the reality of the _danger_.

In some distant part of his mind, he’d always somewhat resented Logan for pulling the hero act, for getting all the glory, and now, now he believed that part of him had been on crack and Logan could keep his hero title, because this? This was not cool.

“Man.” He urged, uselessly, hopelessly. “Man, wake up. C’mon.”

It was nearly a whine as Keith’s gun burned a hole against his skin, tucked in the waistband of his pants.

“Keith Mars. If you are in the building, please return to room 314. Keith Mars, please return to room 314.”

Wallace gaped at the ceiling, the tinny voice that had croaked the announcement. It seemed unreal that the world didn’t realize where Keith was and how unlikely it would be that he responded. Then it hit him. 314 was Mac’s room.

Mac had woken up.

“Heyyyy.” A flat, fuzzy voice drew his attention. “Where…?”

“Man!” Wallace’s fingers curled in frustration. “Worst freaking timing ever.”

His body paused, half turned away, ready to run to the elevators, but reluctant to ditch the groggy man on the bed.

“Weevil? You hear me?” He settled for a quick, brutal stab at the truth and waited for the uncertain nod. “You were drugged, you’re in Neptune Memorial. Logan’s been arrested. Keith has been shot. Aaron Echolls took Veronica god knows where. I have to go, you think you’ll be all right without, you know, barfing anywhere? I’ll get a nurse.”

Weevil blinked, his eyes clouding and clearing, jaw working sullenly and slowly. For a second, Wallace worried that Weevil was about to pass out again. Then the man struggled to sit up, pushing against the paper-thin blanket drawn up over the gown that had replaced his clothes.

“Hey.” Wallace chewed his bottom lip. “Relax, man, I got it. Stay down, okay?”

“No.” Weevil managed to grunt, though it sounded confused and not as forceful as Wallace figured it was supposed to. “I’m comin’.”

He watched, uselessly, as Weevil reached for the IV implanted in the soft flesh of his forearm, peeling the tape back and sliding the tubing out. He unclicked the tabs that held the heart monitors to the end of his fingers and wobbled for a second on the edge of the bed.

“Little help?”

“I don’t think…” Wallace looked back at the busy nurses station. “Yeah, okay, hold on.”

It was surprising, really, how little attention people paid to a half conscious Mexican biker in a hospital gown leaning heavily on a worried, terrified looking skinny black kid as they hobbled out of the emergency department and towards the ward elevators.

***

He carried her.

It wasn’t anywhere near as picturesque as her dreams had been, as she huffed a large gasp of air out through her nose, oxygen pushed unwilling through her lungs and out of her body as his shoulder thumped rhythmically into her abdomen.

She wasn’t in a dress and they weren’t headed into the Echoll’s pool house, but it was just as bad and she couldn’t move as his arms circled her like steel, holding her close to the shifting muscles she could feel in his chest and arms.

It made her want to vomit.

He chuckled at her protests, thick and clumsy bashes of her fists against his back, the sound of his voice misshapen in her ears, warped and stretched.

The air changed around them, from the cold crispness of the night air to the warmer, toastier feel of indoors and Veronica knew they’d entered the house. He had to have a key. He’d probably brought it. It should have been the first place she checked.

It felt strangely and horrifyingly domestic; to hear and feel him humming a tune underneath her as he casually hefted her clumsy and unresponsive body through a small hallway. Shapes, sharp corners of frames and muted colors of odd faces swam past her eyes and she groggily reached out to one smiling man, his face warping and shimmering in front of her.

Her fingernails caught in the wood of the frame and it dragged against the wall, sounding muted inside her head as it fell to the floor and bounced.

The world shifted again and Veronica tried to scream as she felt herself falling, tossed easily like a rug. Her body landed with an awkward thud, thick and sludgy, as the soft feel of buttery leather came up to clutch at her limbs.

She saw the edges of a sofa as her head fell to the side and Aaron’s hands were gone.

Her body wouldn’t react properly, sinking deeper and deeper into inaction as her brain tried to dredge up enough momentum to get her away. She wanted to move, to stand up, to slide herself down off the sofa and out of the pliant position he’d left her in.

Movement caught her eye and she turned her head slowly.

“Logan!” Veronica nearly cried when she saw him standing in front of her. “Logan, help me!”

There was a soft rustle beside her, the sound of denim settling into leather, and she ignored it to try and reach forward, to try and get Logan’s attention. Logan just stared at her, wide eyed and apologetic.

“Veronica?” It didn’t sound like Logan, the whisper; it was too low and too amused. “There’s nobody there.”

Her head swam and she couldn’t think straight, but she managed to lift her skull from the cushion and clumsily propel herself forward.

“Logan.” She begged. “Get me away from here.”

The expression on his face crumpled instantly and she gasped as he doubled over, hands and arms wrapping around his torso as his knees began to buckle.

“Get up, Logan, please!”

He tried to look up at her, but his body was pounded sideways and she all but cried to watch it.

“He never gets up.” Aaron’s voice chuckled in her ear. “Even when he’s real. It’s really quite frustrating.”

A sparkle caught her eye and she looked down. A dark, weathered hand was wrapped around the slender stem of a wine glass and she frowned as the liquid swirled around and around, eddying inside the space provided. A sob throbbed up her throat.

“Stop it.” She didn’t care if she was begging anymore. “Just stop it, please.”

Aaron sighed.

“Veronica. I’m not doing anything.” He chided softly and raised his glass to gesture at the space in front of them. “This here? Whatever you’re seeing? That’s all you, my dear.”

She closed her eyes and breathed. Everything narrowed down to the inhalation of oxygen. It sped through her nostrils and down her trachea, swirling inside her lungs as she kept it hostage, threading through her blood and buzzing at the ends of her nerves, just inside her skin.

As she exhaled, she opened her eyes, trying to dislodge the sight of Logan’s bleeding face and broken body in front of her.

“You hit him.” She spoke slowly. “He was just a kid.”

“Yes, I did.” Aaron shrugged casually. “And he was better for it.”

Her toes tingled and she tried to move them.

“You monster.” She spat as her left foot jerked. “I can’t even…”

They both looked down as her foot clumsily thudded against the bottom of the sofa and landed awkwardly with her ankle at an odd angle.

“Oh, now, come on. That’s a bit hypocritical, isn’t it?” Without blinking, he reached down and readjusted her legs. “You obviously approve of the finished product. I must have done something right. You’re sitting here right now calling him for him to come save you, am I wrong?”

Veronica’s skin crawled as she tried to shift further away from him.

“Where do you think he got this overblown sense of nobility and justice?” Aaron gave a snort, familiar and intimate and chilling. “Certainly not his mother, I can tell you.”

“Spite.” She hissed, trying to find the right words and the right order to say them in. “In spite of, not from you.”

She knew the words were coming, flowing out of her mouth, because he was answering her. But her brain kept dragging, kept stumbling over the simplest things. It felt like she was functioning inside a vat of thick, sludgy substance. Her limbs wouldn’t obey and her words sounded bulky and horribly incorrect.

“Oh, I realize you don’t like me, Veronica, that’s clear enough, but don’t you think your view is a little biased?” A small chuckle. “I’m quite a popular man, you know. Several hundred thousand movie goers can’t be wrong, can they? Did you catch all the tributes? My god, I should die more often.”

The conversation was not happening.

“I’m sure you’d like that, wouldn’t you? But we’re not talking about me, are we?” He settled more comfortably in the sofa next to her, casual and unwanted. “We’re talking about my son. The grand hero, savior extraordinaire, boy wonder. Don’t get me wrong, he’s a good kid, he really is, but don’t for one second think Lynn had anything to do with that. Or Lilly or any of the host of girls he paraded through my house.”

The name sent a frisson through her, unpleasant and horrifying spoken from his lips.

“I didn’t lie to you that day, I hope you know that, I really do like what you bring out in him.” There was something dangerous about his voice, about the way he watched her when he spoke. “You’re not like any of the others and it’s going to hurt him when you’re not there anymore, but that’s inevitable. You want to know the sort of person he was before he was with you?”

Her neck shuddered in a vain attempt to shake her head and her hands splayed on the arm of the sofa, fingers clutching tightly.

“He must have been about thirteen or fourteen and I was called into the principal’s office like the parent of some hackneyed teen rebel, only to learn that Logan had been suspended for fighting. It seems one of the other boys had said some rather disparaging things about Lilly Kane.”

She didn’t want to remember that day, didn’t want to share a memory with Aaron Echolls, but she could see the flush of success and triumph in Lilly’s eyes knowing that the boys had been fighting over her. If Logan had paid attention, he would have realized Lilly hadn’t been at all offended by the remarks to start with, but he hadn’t and had made his position clear with his fists.

“He trembled all the way home, like a damn whipped puppy. I was proud of him for sticking up for you girls, I really was, but before I could tell him that, do you know what he did?” There was a sickening amount of relish in the way Aaron was narrating the story. “He went straight to my closet and brought me a belt. Didn’t even say a word, didn’t look me in the eye, just stood there waiting.”

Her throat, swollen and closed and painfully tight, opened up briefly to release a single sound.

“Noooooo.”

She could already guess the end to the story and confirmation of it would push her over the edge.

“Well.” He winked at her. “A true Hollywood star doesn’t disappoint his audience.”

Her chest heaved and she pushed herself forward, her shoulders slumping down as she fell over her knees.

“I’m going…” It came out gasped as her hands flailed at her sides. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

Every nerve in her body screamed in protest when she felt Aaron’s hands on her shoulders, pulling her back, steadying her.

“You want to know the most ironic thing about it?” He whispered, settling her on the sofa cushion beside him and threading one finger through her hair, pushing it behind her ear. “In the end, it turned out Lilly was nothing but a slut anyway.”

“No.” It burst through her like a jolt of energy and she managed to sit sideways, propelling herself away from the hands that tried to push her back down. “No!”

Her arm thrashed out and she felt her palm slap down over his face, her fingernails digging into skin and scratching furrows. It felt wet and warm and she looked down to see her hand covered in blood.

“Oh, Veronica.” He sighed, disappointed, and she looked up to see him shaking his head. “You shouldn’t have done that.”

The look in his eyes made her skin shrivel and she flinched just before the side of her face exploded.

***

Weevil tried to play it cool as he stood with his back to the wall.

This was something easier said than done as he felt the unfamiliar sensation of cool air floating up his bare legs. He felt drained, as if he’d just gone ten rounds with the successor of the PCHers. It made him slightly dizzy to stand up straight, so the wall had the dual benefit of keeping him upright and hiding his nearly bare ass from view as the flimsy gown shuffled around his hips.

“Wait…” He felt like an idiot and tried to clear his head, tried to picture the scene they were trying to paint. “You’re sayin’ V shot the sheriff? And then they made a movie?”

The thought filled him with something akin to pride.

Wallace, for his part, looked pissed and took a deep breath.

“Not quite. Focus, man, or I’ll drop you back downstairs. We haven’t got time for this.” Then he turned back to the bed and Weevil frowned at his back. “Mac, what do you know?”

The girl on the bed looked blankly at him for a second.

“One of Aaron’s movies, his character was called… called…” Her face paled, but she seemed to shake it off. “Doesn’t matter, the name raised flags. He has accounts off shore, large ones, no apparent history past a year ago, and he bought the house.”

Weevil blinked.

“House?”

Mac’s face blanched a little.

“The one where Veronica caught Aaron the first time.” It was a catch in her voice. “The one where he set fire…”

“Shit!” Wallace spun around, surprising Weevil with a push against the little metal table on wheels by the bed, making it skid across the room and belt into the wall. “I gotta go…”

He could barely stand, but an arm held up at shoulder height stopped Wallace from leaving.

“Not without me.” Weevil panted, his head spinning dangerously with all the new information. “I’m coming.”

Not even the threat of passing out was enough to miss the eye roll that Wallace gave, frustration pooling off him with every second he was prevented from leaving. A quick scan, up and down, made the sneer appear on the boy’s mouth.

“Not like that you’re not. Look, we don’t have time for this.” A frustrated growl escaped. “If you can’t help, stay outta my…”

Weevil eyed the hallway outside Mac’s door, it took him only seconds to find another open door and to see the sleeping man behind it.

“Just gimme a sec.” He paused to catch his breath. “I’ll get some clothes.”

***

She couldn’t breathe.

Her breath came in hot, hard spurts as she gasped, panted out loud, struggling to draw anything into her lungs. Little black lines began to edge into her vision and her hands clawed at her throat.

“Relax, Veronica.” Aaron warned from somewhere above her. “That drug can sometimes have a lung suppressant side effect if you panic too quickly. The little Mexican vet told me that.”

He sounded amused, thoroughly delighted by the turn of events as she felt the wood of the floor press into the bones of her shoulder blades. His voice was toned down, but it did anything but soothe her. She could feel something wet slide into her right ear, thick and warm, and she could have sworn she smelled the copper of her own blood.

The cells inside her chest began to scream.

“They’re so accommodating over the border.”

Her feet scrambled against the floor, sliding over the slick, polished surface as she dug the weight of her knees into it. When she finally found purchase, Veronica gasped desperately as she tried to slide herself across the floor, pushing away from him.

“Hey.” He chided and, before she knew it, she felt the solid weight of a foot press down on her left ankle. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“I…” Her eyes strained against their bonds, held inside her skull by muscle and sinew, threatening to pop right out as she sucked oxygen through her teeth. Her fingernails caught on the skin of her throat. “I… can’t…”

She felt the room shudder and shift with the weight of him kneeling down next to her.

“You know.” He began, conversationally, as if they’d just sat down to coffee and cake. “I’d hoped to drag this on much longer.”

He was there, next to her, leaning over her, she could feel and sense him, even as her vision blurred. Her hands left her throat as she hissed the tiniest amount of air through her teeth. Her fists landed with little dull thumps in the hollows of his collar bones and he laughed, teeth shining above her as her fingers twisted inside his shirt.

“I…” Her throat burned. “I… can’t…” His face twisted just inches from her own, blurred, and she tried to blink her vision clear. “… breathe…”

Her wrists tensed as she clenched his shirt harder.

“I know.” Aaron replied with a small, casual laugh. “You told meee… OOMPH.”

Veronica slammed her knee up high against something she hoped hurt like hell and would prevent him ever finding fun again.

The second he rolled away, curling inwards, she felt her chest expand. Oxygen returned with a cold, energizing rush, flooding her cells with buzzing thrills. Her mouth gaped open as her hands flew out, scrambling against the floor, reaching for hold.

Her fingers caught on the edge of the sofa and she pulled, dragging herself away from the groaning figure.

Stumbling, she managed to climb up to her knees, then her feet. Her body launched itself of it’s own accord, throwing her weight into lurching movements, momentum and not balance carrying her distances as she bounced her way across walls and tables and chairs.

Her eyes caught the briefest flashes of smeared, bloody prints left on the surfaces she touched.

They danced in front of her, little droplets spreading out into thin air and hovering, coalescing into shapes and patterns that tried to distract her. She thought she heard laughter coming from the middle.

“Come back here!”

Veronica blinked and propelled herself through a door, her hands coming to grasp the first surface she could as her legs gave out. Cold, stone marble met her fingers as she clutched hard, desperately trying to stay upright as she looked around, trying to take in her surroundings.

Flashes of silver and black-mirrored surfaces blinked at her like balls of glass.

Kitchen. The word came to her in an instant. She was in the kitchen. She scrambled, using her arms to crawl herself along the bench until she could reach the glittering row of metal handles standing out of a wooden block.

The blade sang as she pulled it out of its sheath and Veronica tried to quiet her loud panting as her eyes searched for somewhere to hide.

***

Logan seethed as he watched the door.

The officers came in two lots, minutes apart.

He could tell the first pair was for him. They looked annoyed and bothered and not at all happy to be there at all as they walked through the entry and glanced around, quickly catching the security guard’s eyes and nodding their intention to come over.

The second pair was a lot more harried, rushing through the door with a look of both frustration and the slightest hint of excitement rushing through the air. They’d come with a purpose and Logan suspected he knew what it was.

“Hey Lamb!” His voice carried over the heads of the tired people with various injuries and illnesses waiting nearby. “Hey, over here!”

He could see the annoyance flash in the Sheriff’s eyes, saw it mirrored in the few heads that raised from the plastic chairs, could feel it in the tightening of the muscles of the man who held him.

“Echolls.” Lamb all but sang as he sauntered over, his decision made. “Should have known you’d be involved. What’s going on?”

“He shot Keith.” The words spat out of his mouth before he could control them, panic flooding his senses as the futility of his position overwhelmed him again. “That bastard shot… you have to let me know. They won’t tell me if he’s okay.”

He could see Lamb’s eyes widen in realization.

“Veronica?”

Logan’s throat closed up and he couldn’t answer.

***

She hunkered down, making herself as small as possible as she let her muscles loosen, finally let the thick swarm of confusion seep through her veins. An arm shifted past her head and she stifled the scream as her hand came up to brush away the sleeve of an overcoat.

The closet whispered around her, sounds of cloth brushing against cloth, the clink of hangers scraping against the pole holding them up, the shifting of shoes as she buried herself deeper.

“Veronica?”

It came as a whisper underneath the crack of the door and she scrunched her eyes shut, biting her lip as she willed even her heart to stop.

“Veronicaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!”

Her name floated around her head, slid into her cochleas and disturbed the tiny feathered down hairs of her inner ears, made her sick with fear. She scrunched her eyes closed tightly, fingers curled around the knife handle as she counted out the traitorous pounding echoing through her chest.

Surely he could hear it.

“I know you’re in here, somewhere!”

The edges of the closet seemed to pulse around her; they throbbed in and out, pushed closer and then further away. A loud crash burst inside her ears, like something loud being thrown against a wall, maybe a chair or a table.

She inched herself back, squirmed further away from the sliver of light pooling underneath the door, and she felt the empty toes of abandoned shoes bump underneath her backside until her back hit solid wall. Her wish was granted when her heart stopped.

The light shivered, winked at her, and she could see the feet stop.

Her legs, wobbly and shaken and trembling like jelly, pushed hard once again and she forced herself upwards, used the leverage of the wall at her back to find height as she drew herself up as close to his height as she could manage.

The knife blade rose.

When light flooded the closet, Veronica was blinded, she cried out in protest as her foot snagged on something and she fell forward.

***

Wallace saw the car before the house, crumpled and abandoned in the trees on the side of the road.

They stopped the car in the middle of the road and ran towards it, not really knowing what they were going to find. Truth be told, he was both panicked and relieved to find it empty. Empty meant no broken bodies, no serious injuries from a car accident.

But empty also meant Veronica had been taken elsewhere. He didn’t even want to know how.

“Look.” There was a deep note of anger threading through Weevil’s voice as he pointed his chin towards the back seat. “That’s blood.”

Somewhere in the ten minute drive, give or take several speeding violations, Weevil had perked up from woozy on his feet to damn well pissed off at the situation. And a pissed off Weevil, Wallace had seen before and also heard from several sources, was not someone he particularly wanted to get on the bad side of.

Even one who looked and acted as if a few trucks had hit them.

The sight of the blood sickened him, so he looked around instead, hoping that, with the car, the house wouldn’t be too far away. Apparently, in complete disobedience to the rest of the night, they were in luck with that.

He saw the lights of the house several hundred feet through some trees and over a dirt track.

“Let’s go.”

Wallace hefted the gun and ignored Weevil’s protests to get it back. They’d had that argument in the car already, settled somewhat when Weevil couldn’t click and clap five times in quick procession at Wallace’s request.

They approached slowly and carefully, listening for any sounds.

They heard none.

There were lights on inside the house and the glow that the windows sent across the drive leading up to the porch was actually quite welcoming. The entire absurdity of the situation felt chilling and Wallace swallowed deeply as he gently lifted his foot to the first step.

He might have the gun, but Weevil had the know-how and he waited as the lock was picked. One day, he was going to get Veronica to show him how to do that.

The door swung open and Wallace entered first, gun at the ready.

Silence met them.

There was broken glass on the floor near a sofa in the living room.

He knew they could both see the blood. On the floor, on the walls, small paths of handprints leading down a hallway.

“Shit.”

Wallace stopped still and felt a body barrel into him from behind. He knew the instant Weevil looked up.

“Holy fucking shit.”

***

Veronica whimpered.

“C’mon.” She felt hands settle themselves on her shoulders. “C’mon, Veronica, let’s go.”

They weren’t real. They were never real. She couldn’t lift her eyes from the floor.  
She felt herself being pulled away and her body resisted with a mind of its own, remained frozen to the spot as her lids rasped over eyeballs too dry to blink for themselves.

She couldn’t lift her eyes from the floor.

“I… I…”

“It’s okay.” Another voice, soft and gentle, and she still wasn’t sure if it was real. “C’mon, V, it’s okay, the cops are here, ambulance too, they wanna check you out.”

It didn’t feel entirely real.

“Miss Mars?” That voice was unfamiliar and she felt herself give a small frown. “Please come with us now.”

All her words dried sticky in the back of her throat.

“I… I…”

She couldn’t lift her eyes from the floor.

“Veronica?” He felt like Wallace, he sounded like Wallace. She really wanted him to be Wallace. “You gotta let them check you out. They just talked to the hospital, your dad’s fine. He’s going to be okay.”

Her brain gave a little jump-start and she shivered.

“Dad?”

She still couldn’t lift her eyes.

“Yeah.” It came at her like a rush, the sudden eagerness of getting a reaction. “A bit sore and sorry for himself, pissed he missed the action, but… he’ll be fine.”

In her mind, the spray of red didn’t indicate fine at all, but she drank the word in.

“Please.” The strange voice interrupted again. “We have to…”

“Give us a fucking minute, Jesus!” She winced at the venom that sounded like Weevil, even when he shushed at her gently. “Seriously, V, you gotta go with them now.”

It sounded so logical in her head when they spelled it out. The paramedics wanted to make sure she was all right. The police wanted to talk to her, they wanted to take her prints and catalogue her clothes, storing each item in a numbered, dated, signed little evidence baggie as they gave her replacements. Threadbare, thin, cotton blank clothes that had no shape and no life.

She knew why, but she just couldn’t take her eyes off the floor.

“Veronica.” Wallace hummed her name at her again, a soothing sound to match the hand that ran soft circles in the middle of her back. “It’s going to be okay. Do you hear me? It’s all going to be okay.”

His voice shook and she wondered if he knew exactly how uncertain he sounded when he said it.

“Okay.” She whispered and let them lead her away.

There were footsteps on the floor, large, sloppy, red footprints that led up to her feet.

How could that ever be okay?

***  
***

They pressed something into her hands and she took it gratefully.

The scent of warm milk and thick cocoa stirred her nostrils and woke something in her belly. She let the warmth seep from the cup into her frozen fingers and didn’t take her eyes off the bed. The machines beeped solidly and evenly.

Veronica wondered how many times she would have to wait by her father’s hospital bed after he’d tried to save her.

That train of thought led to a rocky quarry and she quickly derailed it.

“How you feeling?”

Logan’s soft voice made her look up at him and she smiled gratefully, sadly, if a little falsely, just for his sake. They’d let him out of jail hours earlier and he’d barely left her side since.

She was curled up in an arm chair someone had dragged into the large room, her feet covered in thick, warm woolen socks, her legs ensconced in familiar track pants and her arms in a fleecy hoodie. Wallace had gone to her apartment to get her more comfortable clothes.

He was waiting in Mac’s room. Weevil was downstairs getting checked out again after being sternly reprimanded by the staff that had to raise the alarm after he was discovered missing.

Veronica felt tired and drained and too sick of police questions and papers that needed signing and the slick slide of the syringe in the crook of her arm as they stole her blood.

She refused to leave the room. Lamb and Cliff and the doctors had to come to her.

“Just peachy.” She whispered it into the lip of the cup as she took her first sip.

“Veronica.” Logan sighed in warning, but then let it go, changing topic. “It’s ugly out there. Cameras everywhere.”

Warmth flooded her tongue and she let the heat of it pool there until it built to an almost unbearable pressure. Then she swallowed, letting it coat the insides of her throat. Sensation felt good, solids inside her stomach felt better.

“I know.”

“And the lawyers.” It was a weak joke, but she heard all the underlying messages in his voice, the concern and the relief and the apologies she wasn’t ready for. “The legal binds of this thing alone…”

“Please.” It was the only thing she could say as she watched the steady pulsing beat of her father’s heart. “Not now.”

***  



End file.
